2 Baldrige Criteria For Performance Excellence
2 Baldrige Criteria For Performance Excellence
2 Baldrige Criteria For Performance Excellence
Quality awards have become quite popular in the recent times and are even regarded as
corporate status symbols. Historically it has been recognized that people play a major role in
providing quality and unless the people are motivated and committed towards quality,
improvements will not occur. This fact has been well taken into account while developing the
criteria for the awards. In this paper the role of human resources management in improving
the quality is examined by studying the emphasis on human resources with respect to the
criteria involved in different quality awards. The objective is to ascertain the importance
attached to the human resources management and hence to quantify their contribution towards
becoming an award winning company.
This is the model behind the US Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award, an award process
administered by the American Society for Quality (ASQ) and managed by the National Institute of
Science and Technology (NIST), an agency of the US department of Commerce. This framework is
used as the basis for over 70 other national Business Excellence/Quality awards around the world.
1. Leadership
2. Strategic Planning
5. Workforce Focus
6. Process Management
7. Business Results
The core concepts of the Baldrige Criteria for Performance Excellence are
Visionary leadership
Customer-driven excellence
Agility
Management by fact
Social responsibility
Focus on results and creating value
Systems perspective
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This is the model behind the European Business Excellence Award, an award process run by the
European Foundation for Quality Management (EFQM). This framework is used as the basis for
national business excellence and quality awards across Europe.
1. Leadership
3. People
5. Processes
6. Customer Results
7. People Results
8. Society Results
The fundamental concepts that underpin the EFQM Excellence Model are:
Results Orientation
Customer Focus
Partnership Development
Business Excellence is often described as outstanding practices in managing the organisation and
achieving results, all based on a set of fundamental concepts or values.
These practices have evolved into models for how a world class organisation should operate. These
models have been developed and continue to evolve through extensive study of the practice and
values of the worlds highest performing organisations.
Many countries have developed their own models and use these as frameworks to assess and
recognise the performance of organisations through awards programmes.
The Baldrige performance excellence criteria are a framework that any organization can use to
improve overall performance. Seven categories make up the award criteria:
Leadership
Examines how senior executives guide the organization and how the organization addresses its
responsibilities to the public and practices good citizenship.
Strategic planning
Examines how the organization sets strategic directions and how it determines key action plans.
Examines how the organization determines requirements and expectations of customers and markets.
Examines the management, effective use, and analysis of data and information to support key
organization processes and the organizations performance management system.
Examines how the organization enables its workforce to develop its full potential and how the
workforce is aligned with the organizations objectives.
Process management
Examines aspects of how key production/delivery and support processes are designed, managed, and
improved.
Business results
Examines the organizations performance and improvement in its key business areas: customer
satisfaction, financial and marketplace performance, human resources, supplier and partner
performance, and operational performance. The category also examines how the organization
performs relative to competitors.
The criteria are used by thousands of organizations of all kinds for self-assessment and training and as
a tool to develop performance and business processes. Approximately 2 million copies have been
distributed since the first edition in 1988, and heavy reproduction and electronic access multiply that
number many times.
For many organizations, using the criteria results in better employee relations, higher productivity,
greater customer satisfaction, increased market share, and improved profitability. According to a
report by the Conference Board, a business membership organization, A majority of large U.S. firms
have used the criteria of the Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award for self-improvement, and the
evidence suggests a long-term link between use of the Baldrige criteria and improved business
performance.
3.What is productivity?
Productivity is about how well people combine resources to produce goods and services. For
countries, it is about creating more from available resources such as raw materials, labour, skills,
capital equipment, land, intellectual property, managerial capability and financial capital. With the
right choices, higher production, higher value and higher incomes can be achieved for every hour
worked.
Generally speaking, the higher the productivity of a country, the higher the living standards that it can
afford and the more options it has to choose from to improve wellbeing. Wellbeing can be increased
by things like quality healthcare and education; excellent roads and other infrastructure; safer
communities; stronger support for people who need it; and improved environmental standards.
High productivity societies are characterised by smart choices about savings and investment versus
current consumption; dynamic and competitive markets; openness to trade and to international
connectedness; high awareness of external influences; rapid uptake and smart application of new
technologies, products and processes; and increasing demand for highly skilled and creative people.
These are the successful societies that attract and retain people, ideas and capital.
Key Points
o Productivity can effectively raise living standards through decreasing the required
monetary investment in everyday necessities (and luxuries), making consumers
wealthier and business more profitable and in turn enabling higher government tax
revenues.
Terms
productivity the rate at which goods or services are produced by a standard population of
workers.