Hsin-Hung Wu

TQM Implementation in a Healthcare and Pharmaceutical Logistics Organization: The Case of Zuellig Pharma in Taiwan

This study based upon Zuellig Pharma Inc. in Taiwan has revealed that some TQM methods and tools can be very effective in guiding TQM implementation successfully for the marketing and sales division in a healthcare and pharmaceutical logistics organization. In addition, this study not only states the importance of the quality of employees but also discusses the integration and transformation of the marketing and sales division during the implementation process. From the training of employees to the formation of the marketing-sales team, the team performed extremely well in reducing costs, increasing profits, and meeting the expected target. More importantly, the commitment from management and the determination from this marketing-sales team have significantly improved their own competitiveness through the heart of continuous improvement.

Toward a measure of Chinese hypermarket retail service quality

Success in the increasingly competitive and significant Chinese hypermarket sector requires a systematic focus on service quality. Current measures of hypermarket retail service quality do not adequately capture how the Chinese customers evaluate their experience. This study describes the development of an instrument to measure hypermarket service quality suitable for customers socialised to Chinese culture. Drawing on existing exploratory work, we propose dimensions of Chinese hypermarket service quality and associated items to measure our proposed construct. Confirmatory factor analysis, using a second sample, confirms the dimensionality and validity of our proposed scale with 4 dimensions and 18 items.

A Longitudinal Study of Identifying Critical Factors of Patient Safety Culture in Taiwan

We used importance-agreement analysis to identify critical factors of the hospital survey on patient safety culture from the perceptions of physicians and nurses of a regional teaching hospital in terms of major strengths, minor strengths, minor weaknesses, and major weaknesses. In addition, we collected the raw data from 2011 to 2013 such that the advantages and deficiencies can be traced on a timely basis to enhance patient safety culture. The results show that there are 22, 21, and 21 items belonging to major strengths in 2011, 2012, and 2013, respectively. In contrast, there are 4, 5, and 5 items classified into major weaknesses in 2011, 2012, and 2013, respectively. This study also summarized the similarities and differences in this three-year period. Twenty items are the major strengths. On the contrary, only three items belonged to major weaknesses. Another viewpoint was also provided by taking into account genders in this three-year period. In summary, the hospital management can organize strategic adaptations to improve patient safety by observing the trends of strengths and weaknesses, as well as the similarities and differences in this three-year period. Therefore, hospital management can take appropriate actions to maintain the advantages and address deficiencies in order to enhance patient safety culture in this case hospital.

Family firm and analyst forecasts in an emerging economy

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to examine how family firms affect analyst forecast dispersion, accuracy and optimism and how earnings smoothness as the moderating factor, affects these relationships in an emerging market context. Design/methodology/approach This paper uses the population sample of firms listed on the Taiwan Stock Exchange from 2009 to 2010 as the research sample, which includes 963 firm-year observations. Findings The findings show that analysts following family firms are more likely to have more dispersed, less accurate and more optimism biased forecasts than those following nonfamily firms. Earning smoothness is mainly used by nonfamily firms as a signaling strategy to improve analyst forecast quality. In contrast, earnings smoothness is mainly used by families as a garbling strategy, stimulating forecast optimism. Only earnings smoothness in family firms with a high level of family ownership concentration is likely to be signaling-oriented to improve analyst forecast accuracy and mitigate analyst optimism biases. Originality/value Emerging markets are not only featured by prevailing principal-principal conflicts but also have multiple levels of agency conflicts among large shareholders, minority shareholders and professionally hired managers. This research reveals the multiple governance roles of family owners in affecting analyst forecast quality, including their entrenchment role in extracting private benefits of control through opaque environments and market discipline distortion role in aligning interests between managers and families without prioritizing meeting or beating analyst forecasts, both at the cost of minority shareholders. This research further disentangles the intertwined signaling oriented and garbiling oriented incentives associated with earnings smoothness under family governance.

Using Importance-Performance Analysis to Evaluate PX Mart Service Quality in a Chinese Cultural Setting

A service quality scale for PX Mart in Taiwan has been developed based on a Chinese cultural setting. The developed scale has four dimensions along with twenty four items. Later, this Chinese cultural-based service quality scale is applied to measure the service quality for PX Mart, and importance-performance analysis (IPA) is then used to identify major strengths and weaknesses of service items. From managerial viewpoints, ten items belong to major strengths such that the management can relentlessly enhance these items to gain competitive advantages over rivalries. In contrast, two major weaknesses which belong to interpersonal aspects of service during the process that Chinese customers in Taiwan are concerned most are identified. Therefore, these two drawbacks should be addressed in order to reduce customer dissatisfaction and provide better services.

Revisit employee satisfaction scale: a case study of the regional teaching hospital

This study aimed to construct an updated employee satisfaction scale especially focusing on hospitals. A critical literature review is done to screen potential determinants of employee satisfaction from recognizable journals. Pretest was conducted with 250 samples and 150 valid questionnaires to implement item analysis and exploratory factor analysis. A total of 906 samples (excluding 250 pretest ones) were distributed with 524 valid ones returned (57.84% valid returned rates). Multivariate normality test, confirmatory factor analysis, and various indices of model fit were adopted to ensure the appropriateness of the employee satisfaction model. The results indicate that there are 7 factors, including 34 items confirmed as the measurements of employee satisfaction, especially for the use in the healthcare industry.

Performance measurement systems, TQM and multi-level firm performance: a person–organisation fit perspective

For firms implementing total quality management (TQM), there is a need to redesign performance measurement systems (PMS). Innovated PMS ought to have measurement diversity in their structure with considering the spirit of TQM and emphasise the congruence of goals between employees and firms by adding the viewpoint of person–organisation fit (P–O fit). This paper adopts structural equation modelling (SEM) to examine Taiwanese manufacturing firms to study the association between the P–O fit of PMS and the implementation of TQM, as well as the effects of the adaptation of both to firm performance. Particularly, this paper examines firm performance at multiple levels and gathers data from multiple sources, including archival files and self-reported data from surveys.

A Framework of Applying Ordering Coefficient Based on the Information Energy to Identify the Causal Relationships among Critical Factors from Raw Data

Causal relationships among critical factors have been extensively studied in recent years. The most commonly seen methods based on the questionnaire to construct the causal relationships are decision-making trial and evaluation laboratory (DEMATEL) method and semantic structure analysis (SSA) method. However, both methods have their own limitations. In contrast, an ordering coefficient based on information energy has a solid theoretical background to study causal relationships among critical factors. In order to identify the threshold value to establish causal relationships from the raw data, a bootstrapping Monte Carlo simulation for an ordering coefficient based on information energy was conducted. Finally, a brief case study was presented and discussed with the use of an ordering coefficient based on information energy and a bootstrapping Monte Carlo simulation when the raw data are available to construct the causal relationships among the criteria.