title: Quality management and employee commitment: illustrated with examples from Dutch health care.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  To assess the relationship between quality management and employee commitment.
  
  
  METHODS
  Analysis of the state of affairs with respect to (TQM) programs in The Netherlands based on the literature and interviews with key informants.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Description of an approach that tries to integrate employee commitment and quality management based on the concept of employees' psychological contracts with their organization (ideas about mutual obligations between them and their employer).
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  The interviews with key informants provide limited information; the study is done in only one country. Research in a broader context and on a larger scale would give a more general overview.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  The crucial factor in making quality management work can be better described by "quality fails when employees' psychological contracts are neglected" than by "quality fails when system fails".
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  This paper highlights the essential relationship between quality management and employee commitment and offers suggestions on how to approach this issue.
authors.affiliation: Organization Studies, Tilburg University, Tilburg, The Netherlands.
authors.forename: René
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Schalk
authors.forename: Wim
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: van Dijk
mesh_terms: D003695:Delivery of Health Care / Q000458:organization & administration / Q000592:standards*; D004651:Employment / Q000523:psychology; D006801:Humans; D007407:Interviews as Topic; D007588:Job Satisfaction; D028681:Moral Obligations; D009426:Netherlands; D015279:Organizational Culture; D009937:Organizational Objectives; D010558:Personnel Loyalty; D017749:Total Quality Management