The Official Baldrige Blog
In this judges panel blog series, we have been interviewing members of the Judges’ Panel of the Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award to share individual members’ insights and perspectives on the award process, their experiences, and the Baldrige framework and approach to organizational improvement in general.
The primary role of the Judges’ Panel is to ensure the integrity of the Baldrige Award selection process. Based on a review of results of examiners’ scoring of written applications (the Independent and Consensus Review processes), judges vote on which applicants merit Site Visit Review (the third and final examination stage) to verify and clarify their performance in all seven Criteria categories of the Baldrige Excellence Framework. The judges also review reports from site visit to recommend to the U.S. Secretary of Commerce which organizations to name as U.S. role models—Baldrige Award recipients. No judge participates in any discussion of an organization for which he/she has a real or perceived conflict of interest. Judges serve for a period of three years.
Crotty is one of five new Baldrige judges this year.
What experiences led you to the role of Baldrige judge?
Key experiences that led me to this role include the following:
How do you see the Baldrige Excellence Framework as valuable to organizations in your sector of health care?
Organizations often are managed by people’s individual methods rather than having systems in place to guide people to use standard work processes so that management at all levels is aligned, for instance, using the Baldrige framework, an organization would have a leadership system to set common expectations for performance and make adjustments when needed in a consistent way.
Another example of how the Baldrige framework is valuable comes from my experiences of talking with people in businesses across the country; that is, to resolve the lack of agreement among senior leaders regarding what are their organization’s key services, key customers, key partners, and strategic challenges and advantages. The Baldrige Excellence Framework helps organizations improve their overall performance and all their processes as a system, rather than just improving the quality of their products or services or some procedures.
How do you apply Baldrige principles/concepts to your current experience?
CAMC applies the Baldrige framework principles daily in our focus on operations, quality, leadership, customers, performance measurement, and workforce. CAMC developed 32 systems to help manage the organization and improve quality. These are ingrained in our daily operations. As a 2015 Baldrige Award recipient in health care, we keep these processes and systems active and visible through our “Top 5” boards and safety-focused practices.
As a judge, what would you like to tell current and potential Baldrige Award applicants about the process?
I want to ensure that each applicant has a “roadmap for improvement” and a clear understanding of how to advance their organization’s performance in order to achieve their customers’ expectations for quality products and services.
What encouragement/advice would you give Baldrige examiners for their work in evaluating organizations as part of the Baldrige Award process?
Always learn, understand the applicant’s business model, understand the applicant’s key processes and their requirements, listen to the applicant, and—above all—have fun in the process.
Dr. Kristin Stehouwer (Chair)
Allison A. Carter
Kevin R. McManus
Bruce A. Requa
Tammy L. Dye
Eric K. Fletcher
MG John C. Harris
John R. Molenda, Jr.
Dee Springer
The Baldrige Excellence Framework has empowered organizations to accomplish their missions, improve results, and become more competitive. It includes the Criteria for Performance Excellence, core values and concepts, and guidelines for evaluating your processes and results.
Available versions: Business/Nonprofit, Education, and Health Care