Can sustainable quality management contribute to the organizational performance?

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the role that sustainable quality management (SQM) can play in achieving higher organizational performance. Specifically, this paper intends to conceptualize the SQM and deepen the understanding if the adoption of SQM significantly affects the organizational performance. A structured questionnaire was developed for collecting data from Slovenian organizations. Based on the factor analysis, the factors of SQM are proposed and defined as a set of determinants, named as: Green development and environmental aspects, top management commitment, employee support, CSR and local community engagement. Using a multiple regression analysis, we assessed the contribution of SQM factors to organizational performance. This analysis accounted for approximately 74% of the variance in non-financial organizational performance and approximately 46% of the variance in financial organizational performance, with two main predictors: Top management commitment and employee support. The effect of green development and environmental aspects as well as CSR and local community engagement on financial performance is also considered as positive, but mainly indirect through non-financial performance from the employee perspective.