QUALITY MANAGEMENT PRACTICES IN OIL AND GAS INDUSTRY

Quality Management Practices (QMP) has evolved as a management philosophy with a claim to improve organizational performance. The oil and gas industries have realized the importance of quality to compete and survive in unpredictable market arena. This paper examines the extent of QMP implementation in Oil and Gas sector. Around 52% of the respondents of oil and gas sector opinioned that QMP is implemented. Based on the literature seven QMP factors with 60 items were considered for the study, through the Exploratory Factor Analysis (EFA) 32 items were extracted based on the item loading more than 0.5. Further, these factors were validated by Confirmatory Factor analysis (CFA) using Structural Equation Modeling (SEM). This resulted in five important factors with 31 items indicating good model fit with fit indices all above acceptable range (chi-square statistics was 246.158 with CMIN 1.399, GFI = 0.929, AGFI = 0.907, NFI = 0.902, IFI = 0.968, CFI = 0.967, TLI = 0.961 and RMSEA = 0.037). The five factor QMP measurement model was tested for discriminant and convergent validity. The study reveals that age, educational qualification of employees; nature of job and nature of activities carried out are significantly associated, while gender and experience are not associated with the level of QMP implementation. The results of this paper provide guidance for managers and practitioners in oil and gas sector to implement the proposed 5 factor QMP model (Top management commitment, Employee involvement, Training and Development, Customer focus, Supplier Quality Management) in a systematic way to enhance organizational performance.