Twenty‐Five Years Later

2013 marked the 25th‐anniversary of the Baldrige Program, now called the Baldrige Performance Excellence Program®.

Since its not‐so‐humble beginnings, it has transitioned to a Baldrige Enterprise, a partnership between Baldrige‐based programs, ASQ, and the Foundation, to sustain the Baldrige Program’s mission to improve the competitiveness of all U.S. organizations. In the mid‐1990s, the federal government added appropriations to cover the public side of the unique public‐private partnership, but that appropriation was lost in 2011; the Enterprise was formed to help underpin the Baldrige Program and keep alive the benefit and value to so many organizations.

Included in the Enterprise are 33‐plus state, local, and sector Baldrige‐based programs that all use the Criteria for Performance Excellence® and cover almost all of the states of the union. Most are independent 501(c)3 nonprofits, but some are coordinated by state governments and university systems. All have a Baldrige‐based state‐level award program as their central mission, collectively advancing the Enterprise objective of improving productivity, competitiveness, and outcomes across U.S. organizations. More than 2,200 examiners, 1,400 applicants, and approximately 40 paid staff serve Baldrige‐based state programs.

In addition, 106 international quality programs now base themselves on Baldrige, and several international program representatives attend examiner training in the United States each year. Of the Baldrige Program, the administrator of the Singapore excellence award, Choy Sauw Kook, wrote, “The Baldrige Program has provided us with a benchmark in terms of the development and enhancement of our framework, rigour of assessment methodology, assessor development and recognition, as well as best practice learnings. Within the [Global Excellence Model] Council, the Baldrige Program is seen as the leading excellence progamme, and SPRING Singapore, like other GEM Council members, has always looked to Baldrige for the way forward.”

In 2013, Ninety‐one Baldrige Award winners have served as national role models.

In its 25 years, the Baldrige Program has much evidence of its return on investment. Analysis of data from two‐time Baldrige Award winners shows that the median growth in number of sites was 67%, median growth in revenue was 94%, and median growth in jobs was 63%; the median growth in jobs was nearly 20 times greater than matched industries and time periods, according to the Bureau of Economic Analysis and the Bureau of Labor Statistics, which indicated a comparative average job growth of 3.2%. Hospitals that have won the Baldrige Award have lower rates of mortality and complications, higher profit margins, and higher improvement levels than the 100 Top Hospitals (top 3% nationwide) according to a Thomson Reuters study. And, in 2011, economists reported that for every public $1 spent on the Baldrige Program, the benefit to the U.S. economy is $820. In 2011 alone, the program has tracked nearly 3 million page views of the Baldrige Criteria, and since 1987, more than 2 million print copies have been distributed.

Additional return on investment data are available on the Baldrige Website²³ and in the book Baldrige 20/20: An Executive’s Guide to the Criteria for Performance Excellence²⁴.

On April 7, 2013, the Baldrige Performance Excellence Program and its many supporters gathered for a Gala to celebrate 25 years of performance excellence, 25 years of U.S. organizations learning and becoming more competitive and sustainable, and 25 years of the Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award and the thousands and thousands of organizations that have benefited from it.
 

²² Sorensen, Charles W., and Furst‐Bowe, Julie, “Keep Baldrige Mission Alive”

²³Baldrige Performance Excellence Program

²⁴ Baldrige Performance Excellence Program, National Institute of Standards and Technology, Baldrige 20/20: An Executive’s Guide to the Criteria for Performance Excellence, Gaithersburg, MD: 2011.