In a sluggish economy, TQM is a way to keep profits up. Florida Rock Industries is an example of how well this can work. The TQM program includes a business process improvement initiative in which employees at all levels of the company look for ways to improve operations. Many of the new ideas have come from younger managers in the company.

Over the last five fiscal years, as the company implemented its TQM initiatives, earnings rose at an annual rate of 15.1 percent and the stock rose 150 percent.