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Blogrige

The Official Baldrige Blog

"To Care For Him Who Shall Have Borne the Battle . . . "

By: Christine Schaefer

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By Jeff Lucas (Former Deputy Director, Baldrige Program)

In his second inaugural address President Abraham Lincoln spoke the words from the title of this post as he urged the then divided nation "to finish the work we are in and bind up the nation's wounds."  Since 1930, the federal agencies charged with attending to the needs of the nation's veterans have been consolidated under the Veteran's Administration (VA).  Today, the VA operates a nationwide network of services that include a health system that sees over 75 million outpatients each year, a benefits system that provides education benefits to over 500,000 people annually, and a home loan program that benefits more than 1.4 million families.  And, just in case you were unaware, they also operate The Secretary's Robert W. Carey Performance Excellence Awards -- a Baldrige-based performance improvement and recognition program for entities that provide all of these critical services.

The Carey Awards use the Baldrige Criteria, but have adapted their review and award selection process to meet the unique need of the VA.  They do recognize organizations with a set of tiered awards based on the level of achievement, very similar to that utilized by many of our state and local quality programs (Note to Baldrige Geeks:  one of the organizations recognized this year at the Performance Achievement level was the Hunter Holmes McGuire VA Medical Center, Richmond, Virginia -- employer of our former Baldrige colleague Jane Poulter!).  In addition, they have provided their potential applicants with a number of great resources for planning and writing applications.  These are available at the link above and would also be quite helpful for anyone submitting an application to a state award program or for the Baldrige Award.  You can also find links to the presentations from this year's Carey Awards Symposium which featured a number of organizations familiar to the Baldrige community including:  Heartland Health, North Mississippi Medical Center, and, not surprisingly, the VA Cooperative Studies Center.  

One of the top three reasons that Baldrige Examiners give for the incredible amount of time that they volunteer to our program is the ability to provide service to their country.  So, it should come as no great surprise that numerous members of our community also participate in the Carey Awards as examiners, judges and presenters at the Symposium.  This year's cycle of awards is just getting ready to kickoff and the folks at the VA are always looking for experienced examiners to supplement their internal resources.  If you are an experienced examiner at either the national or state level, live in the DC area, or have an employer who would be willing to fund travel expenses associated with this ongoing professional development (unfortunately the VA cannot cover costs for training or consensus, both of which take place in the DC area, but they do cover travel for site visits), and have not gotten your fill of writing feedback reports, contact Diane Burton at diane.burton [at] va.gov (diane[dot]burton[at]va[dot]gov) and she can give you more details.  

Helping those who provide services to our war veterans "deliver ever increasing value" . . . hard to think of anything more rewarding than that. 

Community and Sector Focused

About the author

Picture of Christine Schaefer

Christine Schaefer

Christine Schaefer is a longtime staff member of the Baldrige Performance Excellence Program (BPEP). Her work has focused on producing BPEP publications and communications. She also has been highly involved in the Baldrige Award process, Baldrige examiner training, and other offerings of the program.

She is a Phi Beta Kappa graduate of the University of Virginia, where she was an Echols Scholar and a double major, receiving highest distinction for her thesis in the interdisciplinary Political & Social Thought Program. She also has a master's degree from Georgetown University, where her studies and thesis focused on social and public policy issues. 

When not working, she sits in traffic in one of the most congested regions of the country, receives consolation from her rescued beagles, writes poetry, practices hot yoga, and tries to cultivate a foundation for three kids to direct their own lifelong learning (and to PLEASE STOP YELLING at each other—after all, we'll never end wars if we can't even make peace at home!).

Related posts

Happy Thanksgiving from the Baldrige Program showing pumpkins in the background.

Happy Thanksgiving 2024

The Baldrige Performance Excellence Program gives thanks to the entire Baldrige community, especially our advisory board (Board of Overseers) and all-volunteer

Comments

Dean Kappel on March 11, 2011 4:58 PM

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Just so you know, the COO for the entire VA healthcare system is Bill Schoenhard. In his previous life he was the Executive VP for SSM healthcare, the first Baldrige winner in the healthcare category. So it is no surprisev that the VA sees the benefit of the criteria.

Bob Bowles on March 11, 2011 5:31 PM

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The U.S. Senate Productivity and Quality Award for Virginia has been accepting award applications from District of Columbia organizations for at least five years. In 2009 the Veteran Affairs Medical Center-Washington, D.C. received the Senate Medallion of Excellence, our top recognition level.

Jeff Lucas on March 14, 2011 9:21 AM

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Dean and Bob Sounds like there is lots of good cross-fertilization between Baldrige and Carey. The idea of organizations taking the base Baldrige Criteria and approach and adapting it to their unique needs seems to work really well. I wrote about how the business schools who accredit through ACBSP had done a really nice job with adapting for business programs. Hopefully the Carey work can become a model for other government agencies.

Christian louboutin slingback on March 21, 2011 10:14 AM

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holding it in a napkin, and he unfurled the side closest to me, "It's a grapefruit." "I love grapefruits," I answered. He nodded, "My friend, he just told me about them and showed me how to eat them, and now I can't get enough of them. I eat them every day when I can get them." "When I lived in California, you could walk through my neighborhood and see all sorts of citrus trees in people's yards, and if the fruit hung over the fence, you could help yourself." He looked over at me and somewhat incredulously asked, "So you grew up eating grapefruits

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