Baldrige in Asia Pacific

A recent article in VietNam News stated that 11 Vietnamese enterprises received 2010 gold awards for the quality of their management systems. The awards are based on the Baldrige model. In addition, 85 companies received silver awards. The number of awards suggests that Vietnamese businesses are embracing the Baldrige model as a means to achieve performance excellence (“Ministry honours nation’s 96 leading enterprises,” VietNam News, December 27, 2010)

Earlier this year, the Asia Pacific Quality Organization gave world-class IAPQA Awards to one large manufacturing company and two large service companies in Mumbai, India, and to a university in Selangor, Malaysia. It also gave Best in Class Awards to organizations in Vietnam, India, China, Sri Lanka, Singapore, and Mexico. You can read the list of winners here.

In addition to Vietnam, several Asia Pacific countries have established quality award programs based, completely or in part, on the Baldrige program. For example, the Singapore Quality Award was launched in 1994. You can see the influence of the Baldrige model on the Singapore criteria, which are available here (pdf). The Australian Business Excellence Award program is managed by SAI Global, an international consulting firm.

In China, Hisense Electric became the first company to with the China Quality Award twice. A well-known home appliance company in China, Hisense expanded into LCD, LED, and plasma televisions, first in China and then internationally, now selling through Best Buy and Wal-Mart. Commenting on the Award, Hisense’s president, Yu Shumin, said, “Transforming from ‘Made in China’ to ‘Created in China’ and building Chinese brands…

The Universality of the Baldrige Model

Any organization of any size or type can integrate the Baldrige model. It wasn’t always that way.

When the Baldrige program started, the Criteria reflected the quality movement in manufacturing. While service organizations could apply for the Award, few had similar experience with quality management. They had trouble relating the Criteria to their businesses. It took three years for the first service company, FedEx, to win the Award.

The Criteria evolved. With the feedback of experienced examiners, NIST made the Criteria more “user-friendly” for service companies and then, in the mid-90s, for small businesses. In this decade, the Criteria have become relevant for healthcare and education and then for nonprofits and government agencies.

Today, every organization can integrate the Baldrige model. Scan the lists of state award winners if you need evidence of that (click here to find their Web sites). And it’s not just every organization in the United States: International programs based on the Baldrige model demonstrate its universality (click here to find out more).

Every organization likes to think it’s unique—at some level, it is—but on the key factors that affect organizational performance, it doesn’t matter what you do. A manufacturer can learn how to improve strategic planning from a medical center. A school district can learn how to manage processes from a small business. A nonprofit can learn how to engage employees from a service company. It’s not even that big a stretch.

What makes this possible is the Baldrige model, which asks the same questions, in the same language (most of the…