| The objective of this research was to determine if differences exist between managers and non-managers in their perceptions of the quality management achievement in their organization. A secondary objective was to determine if the areas of misalignment were associated with overall lower achievement scores than the scores indicated for the areas in alignment.;A survey instrument, designed to measure the level of quality management achievement, was administered to the employees of three companies, all part of one corporation. Of the 130 respondents, 31 were managers and 99 were non-managers. Two sample t tests and the Whitney-Mann U tests were used to compare the responses between these groups.;There were no misalignments found between managers and non-managers in their perceptions of the effectiveness of their organization's quality management system for any of the seven constructs evaluated by this study: (1) Leadership, (2) Continuous Improvement, (3) Employee Fulfillment, (4) Learning, (5) Process Management, (6) Internal/External Cooperation, and (7) Customer Focus. This may indicate that a successfully implemented quality management program increases the degree of alignment between managers and non-managers in an organization.;This research further suggests that there may be a relationship between the alignment between managers and non-managers and the implementation of an effective quality management program. Specifically, there is the possibility that the implementation of an effective quality management system can produce results visible enough to counteract the natural misalignment between managers and non-managers. The results of this study are tentative and need to be reproduced with a larger, more comprehensive sample of a broader population.;Studies have indicated that alignment between managers and non-managers in an organization can increase efficiency, reduce costs and improve customer satisfaction. The findings of this study provide a potential way to increase alignment in an organization and suggest that investing in improving quality management may provide organizational advantages not previously attributed to quality management achievement. |
