2.6.

TQM and Employee Performance With the globalisation of oil industry in general and the peculiarities of the o il industry in Niger Delta of Nigeria, oil firms/companies in the Niger delta ar e faced with a very complex, fluid and changing business environment in which co mpetition has steadily increased. In this environment local companies have to co mpete with well established multinationals that have far superior processes and management techniques. These companies compete in the domestic as well as in th e international markets. They accordingly seek to implement management technique s and practices that have been successfully implemented elsewhere and which they hope will enable them identify changes in their processes that will enable them to positively adapt to their business environment and to remain competitive. One of those management techniques is TQM that tend to generate a lot of discuss ion in the Nigeria oil industry and beyond (Salaheldin, 2009) ( (Fassoula, 2006) . Although there is a lot on the literature written on the application of TQM a nd its impact, these tend to be on operational performance ( (Choi, et al., 1998 ) with little on its effect on organisational and employee performance (Broetzma nn, et al., 1995). In fact most of the study of the impact of TQM on performance was investigated on Small to Medium Enterprises (SME s) in Europe, USA and the far East (Rahman, 2001); (Petroni, 2002); (Seth, et al., 2005); (Demirbag, et al., 2 006); (Sila, 2007)) with little focus on those in developing countries such as N igeria (Koh, et al., 2007).

Performance, according to Slack is is defined as the degree to which an operation f ulfils the performance objectives primary measures in order to meet the needs of th customers secondary measures (Slack, et al., 2001). Understanding performance and h ving the ability to measure it is a necessary first step in performance improvem ent given that in order to gauge the impact of TQM requires an understanding and ability to measure performance ( (Demirbag, et al., 2006); (Koh, et al., 2007)) . Although there have been several studies to gauge the impact of TQM on performan ce levels, these has not focussed on employee performance levels (Salaheldin, 20 09). Rather, these studies have tended to focus on organizational performance an d organizational performance (Sterman, et al., 1997). This lack of adequate stud y of the impact of TQM on employee performance makes this study very necessary. Performance management is a holistic process that enables the determination of o verall performance of an organisation from departments to employee performance l evels (Shah, et al., 2009). According to (Shah, et al., 2009), employee performa nce determination and management should be a complete process which gauges emplo yee fulfilment of organisational objectives. There is however a general confusion between employee performance appraisal and performance management and although there has been a lot research on employee performance appraisal they d id not yield meaningful results Thomas B. Wilson, (Wlson, 1994). In fact, in som e cases, performance appraisal has led to a decline in overall performance of em ployees which is why it has been suggested by Glendinning, (Glendinning, 2002) t o use employee performance management instead. In Nigeria, TQM has been used in the oil industry since Mobil Nigeria Plc as far back as late 1980s in response to problems with quality and to improve producti vity and reduce the number of rejects (Gbadeyan, et al., 2008). And by according to (Gbadeyan, et al., 2008) these new and continuous quality management systems brought in the required quality culture which resulted in improved relationship with the company s suppliers and customers, and a drastically enhanced company imag e which enabled the company to assume leadership in the oil industry. This allow ed the company to delivery perceptual and actual customer satisfaction with a re sultant employee satisfaction and morale (Communications, 2004). But although TQ M brought about overall company improvements as witnessed by an increase in reve nue from N37.l billion in 2002 to N31.5 billion in 2003 representing an of 18%, there is no empirical evidence of the impact of TQM on employee performance. How ever, one can perhaps deduce from the positive impact of TQM on employee satisfa

ction and morale that TQM also positively impact employee performance. And despi te Gbadeyan et al (Gbadeyan, et al., 2008)providing evidence that TQM contribute d in the overall performance levels and to achieving its objectives (Reports, 20 04), the impact of TQM on overall employee performance is but subjective deducti on, and proper study as this study has done, is the proper and only scientific w ay to provide empirical evidence of the impact of TQM on employee performance. 2.7. TQM: A S.W.O.T Analysis SWOT analysis is a very effective tool for effective planning for the evaluation of the Strength, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats to an organisation, proc ess or tool. It looks at both the internal and external factors that impact the stated objective. The internal are generally considered as the strength and the weaknesses whilst the external are generally seen as either opportunities to be exploited or weaknesses that would need to be managed. Table 2 provide a SWOT an alysis of TQM.