Establishing a Comprehensive Quality Management for the Use of Crowd-based Mechanisms by SMEs

This paper describes a concept to adapt the design of quality management in SMEs to better exploit the potential of crowdworking. It shows how the quality management, especially of SMEs, can be organised to make efficient and targeted use of work perfomed by crowd-based mechanisms and continue to ensure that customer requirements are met. The different forms of crowd-based mechanisms will be discussed. Barriers of SMEs in adopting crowdsourcing and strategies to overcome them will be identified. A modular reference process model for the quality-oriented use of crowdworking in SMEs will be developed. In addition, concrete recommendations for action to adapt or supplement the design of quality management in SMEs for the efficient and effective use of crowd-based mechanisms will be given.