Systems of quality management and development strategies in italian SMEs: theories and models supporting decision making.

This paper aims to provide an exploratory survey on quality phenomenon in SMEs by the changing of global economic scenario. Quality began a strategy that cannot be still postponed for microenterprises in order to stay in the market with profit. Economic context involved a rapid change in the concept of quality as a result of the evolution of production methods. For stated reasons, it was considered appropriate to define, in advance, a brief historical overview about the change of quality in relation to the evolution of business systems, it also highlighted main contributions and studies observed over the time. After this consideration, it has conducted a study about Italian small and medium entrepreneurship scenario looking for outline the trends. The definition of SMEs is a difficult concept to categorize as a result of the absence of qualitative and quantitative parameters that can be applied for all sectors and in all circumstances; despite these problem, the European legislator promoted a campaign to standardize the concept, in order to improve actions and policies directed to this segment. The results underlined the high dynamism of small and medium enterprises which now consider quality as a really important choice for the development of their business in global market. However, there are many difficulties in the adaptation of quality management models in SMEs context.