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Job Quality Baldrige Style
Look below to see how Baldrige Award recipients demonstrate many of the strategies and actions recommended in the Job Quality Toolkit, which is based on the Baldrige Excellence Framework. Key aspects of job quality are woven throughout the framework, and are critical parts of award-winning applications.
Recruitment & Hiring
Actively recruit a diverse pool of applicants. Implement skills-based hiring that only requires the education, credentials, and experience needed to do the job. Be intentional about onboarding and retaining workers.
How an Organization That Uses the Baldrige Framework Applies This Driver
Baldrige Award recipient GBMC HealthCare System (GBMC) provides inpatient and outpatient care, an acute care community hospital, primary and specialty care medical practices, and a hospice.
GBMC uses an integrated, 18-step process; environmental analyses; and job search tools to systematically recruit, hire, and on-board new workforce members, ensuring a candidates’ fit with the job and that the workforce represents the diversity of the hiring and patient community. Effectiveness of GBMC’s integrated processes is monitored via key measures in its Talent Acquisitions dashboard, enabling it to track progress toward its vision and mission. Since 2017, first-year turnover for nurses decreased from about 27% to less than 15%, achieving performance in the top 10% of national hospitals.
Benefits
Seek workers’ input on needed and desired benefits, such as paid leave, health insurance, and a retirement plan. Provide them and encourage their use.
How an Organization That Uses the Baldrige Framework Applies This Driver
Two-time Baldrige Award recipient, The Charter School of San Diego (CSSD), which was authorized by the public San Diego Unified School District, provides free, personalized education to engage and redirect grade 6–12 students at risk of not graduating from high school through a hybrid in-person/online study program.
CSSD’s philosophy is to take care of employees so they can focus on putting kids first. To retain its workforce and based on their feedback, the school offers a 100% employer-paid benefits package, including a $2 million insurance policy for each employee, in addition to health insurance, life insurance, retirement plans, and a pay scale that’s above those of local public schools. Customized professional development programs are available to all employees, and a career path is available to those who seek this offering
Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, & Accessibility (DEIA)
Make equal opportunity a core value and practiced norm. Foster systems where all workers feel respected and empowered in the workplace. Identify and remove systemic barriers to DEIA.
How an Organization That Uses the Baldrige Framework Applies This Driver
Two-time Baldrige Award recipient, Elevations Credit Union is a member-owned, nonprofit mortgage lender that offers business banking services, financial solutions, and education.
To ensure its workforce represents the communities it serves, Elevations analyzes the ethnicity- and gender-related demographics of its internal population and compares them to community demographics. An outreach strategy includes targeting diverse populations at college career fairs, via social media, and through sourcing. Elevations has improved rates by 20–40% for the hiring of ethnically diverse employees, promotions of ethnically diverse employees, overall ethnic diversity rate, hourly employee diversity rate, and female diversity rate.
Empowerment & Representation
Ensure that workers have a meaningful voice, without fear of retaliation. Enable workers to contribute to decisions about their work, how it is performed, and organizational direction.
How an Organization That Uses the Baldrige Framework Applies This Driver
Two-time Baldrige Award recipient, Mid-America Transplant is a private, nonprofit organ procurement organization and an eye and tissue bank serving 84 counties in three states.
Mid-America Transplant employees are empowered to resolve customer complaints in real time and at the point of occurrence. A tiered, documented approach allows learning and additional resources for more serious complaints to implement corrective action. In addition, a Relationship Management Process empowers employees to customize interactions to determine a customer’s preferred requirements and communication methods. Rates of customer dissatisfaction, customer complaints, and dissatisfaction by service line have been at or near 0% since 2017.
Job Security & Working Conditions
Ensure a safe, healthy, and accessible workplace and offer job security. Minimize temporary or contractor labor solutions, using such workers mainly to adjust for short-term needs. Assess and schedule hours that are adequate and predictable.
How an Organization That Uses the Baldrige Framework Applies This Driver
MESA, a three-time Baldrige Award recipient, provides products and services to control or prevent corrosion and/or to maintain the structural integrity of steel pipelines and facilities supporting the nation’s energy infrastructure.
MESA has prioritized and integrated a focus on world-class safety, embedding this focus in its hiring, workplace culture, meetings, and day-to-day work. A safety team is responsible for creating preventive programs, including tracking near-misses and first-aid events as proactive leading indicators. MESA’s total recordable incident rate is significantly better than the construction industry best-in-class rate.
Organizational Culture
Demonstrate through explicit behaviors and norms of leadership that all workers belong, are valued, and contribute meaningfully to the organization. Assess workers’ engagement and feelings of respect.
How an Organization That Uses the Baldrige Framework Applies This Driver
Baldrige Award recipient Wellstar Paulding Hospital (WPH) is a community hospital that provides inpatient and outpatient care and emergency services.
WPH’s Neighbors Caring for Neighbors culture guides the workforce to deliver “world-class health care to our neighbors.” Senior leaders actively participate in daily safety and voice-of-the-customer huddles and visit frontline leaders and staff (i.e., leadership rounding). WPH achieved an overall score of 91% on the national Great Place To Work Trust Index Survey, placing it at the Fortune 100 Best Companies To Work For benchmark for all participating industries. It also increased its Great Place To Work Trust scores for credibility, respect, fairness, pride, and camaraderie to the national Great Place To Work top-100 level across the nation.
Pay
Provide an equitable living wage to all workers and ensure fair compensation practices.
How an Organization That Uses the Baldrige Framework Applies This Driver
Baldrige Award recipient, Stellar Solutions is a global provider of systems engineering, integration, and program management expertise in government and commercial programs related to the aerospace field.
Senior leaders’ compensation is tied directly to their performance evaluations, using fact-based metrics and a monthly dashboard. Workforce compensation includes incentives for 10-, 15-, and 20-year tenure milestones. Flexible Time-Off accounts allow employees to accumulate 20 percent of their base salary. In addition, spot bonuses are given to employees for writing technical papers or participating on conference panels as part of the Shout Out Bonus Program. Stellar ranks above the 95th percentile in relation to Great Place to Work benchmarks for employee satisfaction with benefits.
Skill & Career Advancement
Provide opportunities and tools for workers’ self-realization and advancement in their current jobs, within the organization, and outside it.
How an Organization That Uses the Baldrige Framework Applies This Driver
Baldrige Award recipient, AARP is the nation’s largest nonprofit, nonpartisan organization dedicated to empowering people 50 and older to choose how they live as they age.
A dedicated talent development team works to offer development opportunities such as executive coaching, a Career Development Program, leadership development programs, a Learning Management System, and tuition reimbursement. Measuring itself against national comparisons, AARP’s results for the survey item “I Get the Formal Training I Want for My Career” rank in the 80th percentile. Annual spending on staff training has increased over the past three years, to around $2.5 million, and for the past three years, AARP has been annually recognized as a “Top Workplace” by The Washington Post.
Contacts
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Baldrige Customer Service(301) 975-2036NIST/BPEP
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