translate to high perceptual ratings on quality practices and performance. Subba Rao et.al. [1997] analyse both
quality practices and performance in India, China and Mexico. Again the results point to statistically
significant differences with respect to quality practices among these countries. According to this study, top
management support turned out to be a very significant factor affecting all quality practices, while
information and analysis as well as quality assurance practices were affected by the length of quality
experience within companies. Madu et. al. [1995] in their study of quality practices in the U.S. and Taiwan,
show that there are significant differences in managers’ perceptions of quality dimensions and their
relationships to organisational performance across the two countries.
2.0 Methodology
Primary data from the third round of the International Manufacturing Strategy Survey (IMSS) are employed
in this paper. The IMSS addresses firm strategy, competitive priorities, capabilities, operations and
performance. To date three surveys have been administered (1992, 1996 and 2001). The survey covers firms
in the ISIC (rev.2) Division 38 - Manufacture of Fabricated Metal Products, Machinery and Equipment
covering sub sectors 381-metal products, except machinery and equipment, 382 -machinery, except electrical,
383-Electrical equipment apparatus, appliances and supplies, 384-transportation equipment and 385-
professional and scientific and measuring and controlling equipment and of photographic and optical goods.
The survey was conducted using a self-administered questionnaire completed by the director/head of
operations/manufacturing and the unit of analysis is the plant/business unit with sampling biased towards best
practice and best performing firms. Data from each country were gathered by local institutions participating in
the IMSS network who, in some cases, translated and/or assisted respondents in completing the questionnaire.
Data from 17 countries are employed comprising 558 respondents. Previous work on this data by the authors
has included analyses of innovation and performance particularly of Irish based manufacturing [Brennan,
Crowe et al, 2002; Brennan, Crowe et al, 2003]. This paper specifically examines the role of quality priorities,
practices and performance among all countries. In the questionnaire quality priorities (the importance of
superior product design and quality as well as superior conformance quality) are asked in a list of ten
competitive priorities based on numerical scales (1-5), that is the importance of order winners and how these
have changed in the previous three years including: price, delivery dependability and speed, customer service,
product range, frequency of new products, order size flexibility and environmentally sound products. The
importance of quality improvement goals (manufacturing conformance and product quality and reliability) for
the next three years are also given in scales of 1=not important-5=very important. Quality practices include a
question on use of quality action programmes such as TQM, 6-Sigma and quality circles over the previous
three and the next three years (level of use is also given as a numerical scale 1=no use -5=high use). The
breakdown between preventive and corrective quality costs is given as well as allocation of costs among
inspection/control (sampling, supervision, lab tests), control (e.g. scrap, losses), preventive (training,
documentation, preventive maintenance) and external (e.g. warranty costs, returns). ISO9000/14000
certification and the role of quality in supplier selection and the use of computer-aided inspection are also
used. Finally, quality performance improvement (manufacturing conformance and product quality and
reliability) over the previous three years is given in a scale of 1=strongly deteriorated to 5=strongly improved.
These quality priorities, practices and performances are compared across 17 countries, industrial sub-sectors.
They are also compared by type of manufacturing operations such as process type (fabrication/assembly mix)
and by type of customer orders (designed/engineered, manufactured, procured or assembled to order,
produced to stock) as well as by process layout (job shop, cellular layout or dedicated lines) and by position
on the value chain that is type of customer (component manufacturers, product assemblers, distributors, end-
users).