European quality challenges for the new Millenium

This paper explores the quality challenges which need to be addressed through further research by the European academic research community in the twenty‐first century. They are also some of the issues which organisations aspiring to be “world class” need to address. The issues are examined under a three part categorisation of organisation, management and change; planning, introduction and sustaining total quality management (TQM); and systems, tools and techniques. The paper also argues that there is a need to think through how TQM research is carried out in order to address the issues aired in the paper.