Abstract

Entrepreneurial culture and quality practice in small and medium sized enterprises (SME) in R. Macedonia

The employees in a powerful organizational culture have a sense of mission which in turn can increase productivity. Esentially, the employees within a powerful organizational culture know what’s required of them and thus they react positively when faced with changes. In the opposite instance, the employees within a weak organizational culture dedicate plenty of time to making a decision about what to do next and how to come about it. The culture is good only if it’s adequate to the context, i.e. to the objective circumstances of the industry or the business strategy in question.
The creation of harmonized relations at all organizational levels, the integration of the employees towards common goals and the creation of the sense of work responsibility with the employees, all these are factors which are taken into consideration in the creation of the cultural change and the realization of the strategic plan. The firm organizational culture can improve quality, as well as the operative and business process. The change of culture is the most important inhibitor in the implementation of the principles of quality. There are initiatives, for the support of the necessary cultural change in terms of improvement, which are generally described as part of total quality management (TQM), which directly led to creating a culture with specific characteristics.
The organizational culture, which tends towards continuous improvement and TQM are considered crucial factors in improving the skills in the business enterprises, especially in terms of innovation. The emphasis and the upgrade of the extraordinary objective such as quality, within a diversified organization, not only can lead to improvement of quality but it can also diminish conflicts and misunderstandings among the employees by giving them a unified goal, a common language and culture, which was lacking before.
The greatest problems related to the implementation of TQM are considered to be the insufficient understanding of the degree of necessary commitment in the organization. The business enterprises, besides, should take into consideration the sizeable time frame necessary for the adaptation of the culture of the organization to the basic philosophy of TQM. The organization committed to TQM has a culture based on commitment to customer satisfaction through continuous improvement. Such culture varies from organization to organization but still, there are certain basic principles which can be implemented everywhere in order to ensure a greater share of the market, profit increase and decrease in expenses.

Key words: organizational culture, quality, cultural change, countinious improvement.