Societal and economic changes generate problems with unemployment and decreased public services, in particular in rural areas. Therefore, different solutions to the problems are of interest to policy-makers. In this qualitative study, with data sampling methods chiefly in the form of interviews and questionnaires, the results show that values, methodologies and tools from Total Quality Management (TQM) are applicable to community issues, especially when establishing cooperation between residents, authorities, business, and other organizations. Based on these results, a cooperation model for the third sector based on Total Quality Management is presented. The model consists of a proposal for organizing improvement work seen from two so-called dimensions.