THE IMPLEMENTATION-PERFORMANCE LINKAGE HYPOTHESIS
Whether or not CQI/TQM becomes another management fad may ultimately depend on the quality of its implementation. It is measured by employee evaluations of quality improvement activities based on the Baldrige Award (U.S. Chamber of Commerce 1993} categories involving leadership, information and analysis, human resources utilization, quality management, and strategic quality planning. The extent to which employees believe these activities are actually occurring in the organization are hypothesized to be positively associated with greater perceived impact on organization performance and more efficient use of resources for selected clinical conditions. Hence hypothesis four: