CBPM Conference 2026 · Vol. 2026, Issue 1

Total Quality Management Awareness and Practice in Digitalising Construction Industry: Insights from Construction Professionals in Imo State, Nigeria

Diekolola Abiola-Ogedengbe and Molusiwa Stephan Ramabodu

Keywords: Construction 4.0, Construction Quality Management, Deming PDCA Cycle, Nigerian Construction Firms, TQM Awareness-practice gap.

Abstract

Persistent quality failure remains a defining problem of the Nigerian construction industry, and the sector's migration towards digitally enabled project delivery raises new questions about whether established Total Quality Management (TQM) principles are understood and practiced by the professionals expected to work within such systems. This study established an empirical baseline of TQM awareness and practice among construction professionals in Imo State, Nigeria, and identifies the TQM dimensions on which digitally enabled quality management would deliver the greatest improvement. Adopting a positivist, quantitative survey design, structuredmquestionnaires were administered to professionals in 63 accessible firms drawn from the 172 contracting firms registered with the Imo State Ministry of Works; 106 valid responses were obtained from 159 questionnaires distributed, a response rate of 66.7%. Internal consistency of the ten-item practice scale was confirmed using Cronbach's alpha (? = 0.913), and the data were analysed using descriptive statistics and Mean Item Score (MIS) ranking. The results showed that 72.6% of respondents were aware of TQM principles but only 48.1% worked in organisations applying them, an awareness-to-practice conversion rate of 66.2%, while only 12.3% reported highlevel application. Procurement quality control through strict adherence to standards ranked highest (MIS = 4.37), whereas the deployment of modern technological facilities (MIS = 3.30) and communication between operational staff and senior management (MIS = 3.28) ranked lowest. The study concluded that the binding constraint on construction quality is organisational and that practice is arrested between the Plan and Do phases of the Deming cycle.