This study examined the relationship between total quality management (TQM) practices and operational performance in the utility pole treatment industry, using Uganda Electricity Distribution Company Limited (UEDCL) as the case. The utility pole treatment segment occupies a critical position within Uganda's electricity distribution value chain, since the durability of treated wooden poles directly determines network reliability, the frequency of unplanned outages, and the lifecycle cost of distribution infrastructure. Despite substantial investment in preservative treatment plants and quality inspection regimes, UEDCL has continued to record pole rejection rates, premature pole failures, and treatment cycle delays that suggest an incomplete institutionalisation of quality management. Guided by a positivist philosophy and a cross sectional survey design, the study collected quantitative data from 132 respondents drawn from treatment plant operations, quality assurance, procurement, engineering, and supervisory cadres, selected through stratified random sampling from a target population of 198. A structured questionnaire anchored on a fivepoint Likert scale measured four TQM dimensions, namely top management commitment, process management, employee involvement and training, and customer focus, alongside operational performance measured through quality conformance, cost efficiency, delivery reliability, and flexibility. Data were analysed using descriptive statistics, Pearson product-moment correlation, and multiple linear regression in SPSS version 26. Findings revealed that process management recorded the highest mean score while employee involvement recorded the lowest. All four TQM dimensions were significantly and positively correlated with operational performance, with process management showing the strongest association (r = 0.712, p < 0.01), followed by top management commitment (r = 0.658, p < 0.01), customer focus (r = 0.591, p < 0.01), and employee involvement (r = 0.544, p < 0.01). The regression model was significant (F = 47.83, p < 0.001) and explained 59.7 per cent of the variance in operational performance, with process management (β = 0.362, p < 0.001) and top management commitment (β = 0.284, p < 0.001) emerging as the strongest predictors. The study concludes that TQM is a substantive determinant of operational performance in pole treatment operations and recommends that UEDCL institutionalise statistical process control at the retort and posttreatment stages, strengthen preservative retention verification, and invest in structured operator competency development.