One of the obvious differences between Baldrige Award recipients and organizations new to the Baldrige model is their use of in-process measures: The latter are often unclear about what in-process measures are, what they have, and what is actually useful.

In-process measures track the performance of a process as it is unfolding, providing real-time feedback that can be acted upon without waiting for the process to end, at which point end-of-process or outcome measures tell you the results of that process. In a perfect world, in-process measures align with end-of-process measures. Most of the results in Category 7 of a Baldrige application are for end-of-process measures. The alignment allows an organization to predict how it will perform on those end-of-process measures and fix problems during the process to get better results.

You can pick any result in any Category 7 Item, identify the process or processes that produce that result, and determine the in-process measures that will predict that result. For example, on-time delivery of a product or service is a common end-of-process metric. In-process measures that predict your performance on on-time delivery might include time to enter an order in the system, time to produce a product or service, and time to deliver that product or service to the customer. The time it takes for every step in the process can be measured and these in-process measures will predict your performance on on-time delivery.

The Baldrige Criteria ask about in-process measures in two places:

• 4.1a1: How do you select, collect, align, and integrate data and information for tracking daily operations?
• 6.2b1: What are your key performance measures or indicators and in-process measures used for the control and improvement of your work processes?

You will also need to understand in-process measures to respond to Criteria questions about how sensitive your performance measurement system is to rapid or unexpected changes (4.1a3), your organization’s ability to respond rapidly to changing needs and challenges (4.1b), how you control costs and minimize defects (6.2b2), and how you improve your work processes (6.2c).

But that’s not the first step. The first step is to move from a functional perspective to a process orientation, at which point identifying, tracking, and acting upon in-process measures will help you control and improve your work processes.

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