A Few Impressive Baldrige-User Results

Two-time Baldrige Winners—organizations that continued using the Baldrige Criteria for at least six years after winning the first time—were examined. Here are some economic growth results:

• median growth in number of sites was 67%
• median growth in revenue was 93%
• median growth in jobs was 63%. The comparative average growth in jobs for the matched industries and time periods was 3.2%.

In Health Care, Thomson Reuters just published a study that found Baldrige hospitals (those that either received a site visit or the Baldrige Award at the national level) outperformed non-Baldrige hospitals on nearly all of the measures of performance used in the Thomson Reuters 100 Top Hospitals, including:

• risk-adjusted mortality index
• risk-adjusted complications index
• patient safety index
• CMS core meausres score
• severity-adjusted average length of stay
• adjusted operating profit margin

Baldrige hospitals were also significantly more likely than peers to display faster five-year performance improvement.

Additionally, here are Some Impressive Baldrige Data Points

• 482 U.S. organizations have applied for the Baldrige Award between 2005 and 2010
• 83 applicants in 2010 represent 277,700 jobs, 1,500 work locations, over $38.5 billion in revenues/budget, and more than 80 million customers served
• 91 Baldrige Award serve as national role models of how to run a successful, world-class organization
• 578 Baldrige examiners volunteered roughly $8.8 million in services in 2010
• 2,270 State Baldrige-based examiners volunteered around $29.5 million in services to evaluate 1,350 organizations at the state level in 2010

A Process for Socio-Economic Maturity

The Baldrige Criteria, at its essence, is a systems-based process for people to become a community that is capable of being excellent. It is a structured approach to becoming progressively more productive, efficient, and effective, but also more whole as individual people, individual organizations, individual communities, individual nations and, ultimately, as an interdependent World. It is difficult, it is about change. It is about creating something better for all stakeholders. It is not for the faint-hearted. The organization becomes a learning community that is continuously engaged with each other in deciding what is right and figuring out how to get it done well.

The Massachusetts Performance Excellence Awards

MassExcellence is a not-for-profit organization dedicated to helping organizations maintain good jobs, and be competitive and economically sustainable. Doing that is a result of how effective leadership and management is. We help leadership use the proven Baldrige Criteria for Performance Excellence as a valid framework for how to run their organization better in today's competitive and globalized economy.

The Baldrige Criteria is named for a former U.S. Secretary of Commerce. It was created by an Act of Congress in 1987. It has been continuously monitored and improved over the years to where it now helps leaders improve their quality, organizational development, and systems thinking.

MassExcellence conducts the annual Massachusetts Performance Excellence Award Program. The award program, while providing significant public recognition, is primarily a leadership tool that enables organization leaders to receive a Baldrige-based assessment of their organization. The evaluation provides expert feedback about how well their organization is performing with respect to the Criteria. Award program applicants receive a detailed feedback report from a team of trained examiners who review their 50-page application and conduct a three-day site visit as a follow-up to the written application. Writing a good 50-page application may sound like a lot of work, and it is, but CEOs will typically tell us that the resulting feedback report is the best comprehensive consulting they ever got and was well worth the time and effort.