January 26, 1995: Vol26n14: Grant to School of Management to expand total quality management center

By LISA J WILEY
News Bureau Staff
The UB School of Management is the lead institution in a $3-million
grant to the State University of New York system to expand the
activities of its Center for Total Quality Management at the Technical
University of Budapest (TUB).
	The grant, which will award UB $750,000 per year through 1998,
comes from the Management Training and Economic Education Program of
the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), said
John M. Thomas, associate dean for international programs in the UB
School of Management and the project's Buffalo director.
	Thomas said the SUNY grant was obtained through the efforts of
Ron Oppen, director of East European programs in the SUNY central
administration Office of International Programs. "We have worked
closely and effectively with SUNY on this and other projects," Thomas
noted.JThe Center for Total Quality Management, established in 1993,
seeks to promote the principles and techniques of total quality
management to help Hungarian managers and enterprises become more
competitive in the global marketplace through greater attention to
quality control and customer satisfaction.
	Under the grant, the center will focus its outreach programs
on companies outside the Budapest area -- specifically in the cities
of Pecs, Debrecen, Sopron, Szeged, Vesprem and Gyor.
	"We've really formed a consortium of universities and colleges
working with us. It's a Hungary-wide program," Thomas said.
	Two important new programs have been recently inaugurated as a
result of the grant:
	n An intensive "mini-MBA" certificate program, to be offered
annually by UB faculty, that will enable qualified TUB students to
complement their technical training with a background in management.
School of Management faculty conducted the program -- a five-day,
40-hour program of instruction -- for a group of 50 third- and
fourth-year students in the TUB undergraduate engineering program for
the first time last October. Faculty included Thomas; Arun K. Jain,
chair of marketing and Samuel P. Capen Professor of Marketing
Research; Philip R. Perry, associate professor of finance and
managerial economics; Victor Pastena, professor of accounting, and
James Meindl, professor of organizations and human resources.
	In Study tours for Hungarian faculty and business people to
visit Buffalo and see Western New York companies and other
organizations practicing TQM. The visitors are linked with local
professionals to learn how the principles of TQM are applied in
practice. The first study tour, held Oct. 29-Nov. 12, brought 14
Hungarians, who visited such sites as Praxair, Inc., and Buffalo
General Hospital. UB will host two groups per year.
	In addition, UB has initiated a new university-wide
faculty/student exchange agreement with TUB that allows TUB students
to pursue graduate studies in engineering and management at UB, while
UB students study Hungarian language and culture at TUB, beginning
this summer.