THE BENEFITS OF QUALITY AWARDS

Attaining quality leadership means much more than achieving a low level of product defects.
Quality leadership means achieving the highest levels of excellence in all areas of organizational operations and performance.

Over the past few decades, many quality award programs have evolved to recognize quality leading organizations. One of these is the Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award (MBNQA) which began in the United States in 1988.

Use of the MBNQA has proven so successful, that some companies have adopted it for internal assessments and in-house awards programs. Similar programs have been implemented in other regions and countries around the world. Use of quality award programs has helped businesses and other organizations improve their ability to compete and fulfill their organization’s missions.

Yet, surprisingly few organizations participate in quality award programs. Some have participated for a short period, only to abandon the effort before any improvements are recognized. Most never make an attempt.

There are many stated reasons for not participating:

• “It’s too time consuming”
• “It distracts from other important matters”
• “It doesn’t work for us”
• “There is no benefit from winning”
• … and the list goes on

By failing to participate in a quality awards program, organizations may not be getting a true picture of how the organization is actually performing and what it can do to improve. Most organizations lack a methodology for getting a holistic evaluation of their business performance.
They may get feedback in very narrow areas of focus such as financial ratings in business journals, customer satisfaction comparisons from industry surveys, or market share from market research reports. However, they rarely get a broad based evaluation of performance, considering all the important metrics that would be represented in a balanced scorecard for example.

More importantly, evaluations may be based upon results only, without consideration for the organization’s approaches and processes. Evaluation of performance by looking at results only will not provide an understanding of why the organization is performing the way it is.

Evidence shows that award winning organizations achieve higher levels of broad based success. This has been proven by multiple studies of long term business results of award winning organizations. Participation in quality awards programs have enabled these organizations to better understand what to do and how to do it.
They compare company approaches to proven models for organizational success.
They take advantage of expert third party feedback to implement performance improvement plans.
They know where to focus process improvements to achieve the desired organizational results.

One of the original quality awards was the Deming Prize given by the Japanese Union of Scientists and Engineers (JUSE) annually beginning in 1950. Since then, other quality award programs have been offered through various sources.
Following the creation of the Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award in 1988, other regions and countries have developed national quality awards.
The European Quality Award, which began in 1992, has a similar makeup and application to the Baldrige award.
Many other countries around the globe now have some type of national quality award including; China, Japan, Singapore, Brazil, and Australia.

Most U.S. States offer some type of quality award. Other sponsors of quality awards include professional societies, universities, internal company quality awards, and supplier quality awards.

The Baldrige award has expanded its reach from the three original award sector groups to six; including manufacturing, service, healthcare, education, small business, and not-for-profit.

Most quality award programs include the following components:

• Application Criteria – The application process consists of questions which seek information on the approaches used and the results achieved by the organization. The Baldrige Criteria for example, contain over 100 questions which are categorized into 7 sections or categories. Many organizations have found tremendous benefit in conducting self assessments using the award criteria without even submitting the application into the awards process
• Scoring System – The scoring system provides a means for determining the level of quality leadership attained by an organization. Some scoring systems provide component scores to aid organizations in determining some of their greatest areas, as well as areas of strength or weakness
• Examination/Judging Process – This defines how organizations are evaluated and how award winners are selected. Many awards processes have several stages of evaluation whereby advancement in the process can be an indicator of the level of quality leadership. In the Baldrige awards process for example, the organizations that receive a site visit are sometimes referred to as the “semi-finalists”, representing the final group of organizations from which the award winners are selected

At Juran Institute, we have seen many organizations effectively use quality award programs to advance their journey to attain quality leadership. From our experience, here are some guidelines for effectively using quality award programs:

• Do it to drive excellence, not to win the award.
  Many organizations have gotten off track by making the award the ultimate goal. This can result in gaming the system to look better than you actually are. In the meantime, the organizations lose sight of their true purpose of providing value adding products and services to customers.
• Use your company language, not the award language.
  The terms and phrases used in award criteria may be good for a generic application, but they may not be the best fit in your company. Company taxonomy is part of company culture. For example, if you refer to employees as associates, then you do not need to change just because the application asks for employee related information. Integrate the concepts into the way you do things, using words that make sense for your organization.
• Use a long term focus.
  Once and done is almost always a wasted effort. It is not enough to reach award winning levels of quality leadership. The real goal is to sustain quality leadership performance. Most quality award winning organizations will self assess and apply multiple times over several years. They recognize that achieving and sustaining quality leadership is a journey.
• Use the feedback.
  It is always amazing when an organization goes all the way through the process of compiling and submitting an application and then ignores the feedback they receive from the evaluation process. This is the gold nugget. This can be some of the best advice an organization will ever receive from a team of industry leading experts. Smart organizations use this feedback as a major component of strategic and business planning to identify areas of focus.
• Focus on process.
  The results will follow. Most quality award criteria seek information related to business processes and business results. The key to success is to understand how processes drive results and focus on improving the processes so better results can be attained.
• Involve leaders.
  Leadership for Quality cannot be delegated. It must be led from the top. Accordingly, organization leaders need to understand the awards process and criteria. Leaders need to use quality award assessment feedback in deciding where to put focus and resources.
• Develop internal expertise.
  The awards cycle will provide valuable feedback to the organization, but it can take a long time to get the information. Organizations which develop internal expertise can strengthen their own assessment processes. This enables the organization to get regular and timely information for improving processes and performance.

If your organization is seeking Quality Leadership, then quality awards can play a significant part in helping you along the journey. Quality awards provide an excellent source for monitoring progress and identifying opportunities for improvement.