Persepsi Pegawai-Pegawai Perkhidmatan Pendidikan Negeri Perak Terhadap Kewujudan Sokongan Pengurusan Atasan Dalam Amalan Pengurusan Kualiti Menyeluruh (TQM)

This research study was designed to investigate the perception of Education Service Officers towards the presence of top management support in implementing Total Quality Management (TQM) in schools and Teacher’s Training Colleges in the state of Perak. Top management support is one of the integral elements in TQM as outlined by the Development Administration Circular (PKPA), Public Service Department of Malaysia (1992).
Specifically, this study was designed to investigate the levels of support and commitment among the top management in implementing TQM through the following: creation and development of quality policy and management structure; planning and providing education and training programs;
participative style of management; management of change process; and organizing of quality programs. These elements were inspired by the models and elements derived from the PKPA (1992), Louer (1993), Brown (1994), Mann (1995) and Bemowski (1996).
The data for the study was gathered by administering 29 self-constructed item questionnaire. A total of 458 teachers and lecturers from various types of secondary schools and teacher training colleges in state of Perak were the respondents for this study. The data collected were analysed qualitatively and quantitatively. 6 major research questions were formulated, tested using the t-Test and Analysis of Variance (ANOVA).
The data revealed that levels of support given by top management was fair. The levels of support provided varies significantly with types of school and college that were involved in this study. This study also revealed that there
was significant difference in the levels of perception among the Perak Education Service Officers. The designation, the attendance in TQM training, and the ethnic group of the officers were found to be the cause of
the different perceptions. However the results also revealed that there is no significant difference of perception by respondents and factors such as sex,
marital status, age, duration of service and academic qualifications.
This study hopes to contribute data for further research in generating new framework, new hypotheses, and new instrument and questionnaire to measure quality top management support in schools and colleges. The
Education Ministry, in their bid to propose the implementation of TQM in schools will get a preliminary picture on the present state of quality top management support among education service officers and could move on
to improve any weaknesses so that they could perfect the implementation when it is due.