Posted by Christine Schaefer Think you need gifted people in your organization to succeed? Or that sheer hard work is bound to deliver your desired results? Either way, think again. Geoff Colvin, Fortune magazine senior editor-at-large and author of Talented Is Overrated: What Really Separates World-Class Performers from Everybody Else, makes the case that innate talent is not what’s behind the greatest performances in multiple fields of human endeavor. At the same time, he finds that the work it takes to achieve the best performance must reflect a few critical elements and principles. The good news Colvin conveys is that individuals and organizations alike can achieve high performance through the developmental approach he calls deliberate practice. I recently interviewed him to learn more about his insights on great performance and his keynote presentation at the Baldrige Program’s upcoming Quest for Excellence® conference. Following is the interview. Geoff Colvin; image used with permission During your Quest for Excellence presentation, will you explain how organizations can improve and excel through such practice? Yes. First I’ll tell you why I think this is so important and why I strongly believe that it’s more important than it used to be for organizations to do this. A trend that has accelerated greatly since I was writing Talented Is Overrated is that standards are rising in any competitive field. And the vast majority of the organizations that we all deal with are in competitive fields, even if they’re nonprofit organizations. Nonprofits are still trying to fulfill a mission, and there are forces out there that may well be trying to fulfill that mission better than they do. They may be motivated entirely by humanitarian goals, but they’re still going to have to get better if they want to fulfill their mission. Of course, in profit-making businesses, competition has been a fact of life forever, but it’s getting more intense. There are a few reasons for this. One is that customers and competitors increasingly have more information and are better able to communicate with one another. What that means essentially is that information costs, transaction costs, and switching costs are dropping essentially to zero. This is what Bill Gates long ago called a friction-free economy, which is a wonderful thing—it’s extremely efficient—but the reality is that lots of organizations actually relied on friction: Life was a little easier for them because customers didn’t know they could get a better deal someplace else. Or even if they knew, it was too hard to make the switch; the transactions were expensive so they didn’t make the switch. In the Baldrige Program, we work with organizations in the health care and education sectors too that have had to address new challenges as customers and other stakeholders come to them with much information that’s available online these days. I get precisely the same response when I talk about these things to many different groups. Recently I was talking to a group that was overwhelmingly business people; one member of the audience came up to me afterward and said he was a staff member on a congressional committee. And he said, "Everything that you’re talking about applies to us in government." And people from universities have come up to me to say that everything that I was talking about applies to them as well. So in all sectors of the economy, you’re seeing organizations facing more complex challenges in their operating environments today? Right. That’s really it. We’re all facing these new challenges. To respond effectively—to remain effective organizations—we all have to get better. Depending on the kind of business that you’re in and the kind of organization you are, you may be facing pressures from around the world, even in health care. We all use the phrase world-class pretty loosely, but the truth is that there is international competition in a great number of sectors today. So we actually have to be world-class. We have to figure out how to get significantly better in ways that we didn’t have to do before. Everyone wants to get better—that’s all very nice. But the truth is, we have to get better in this more open, friction-free environment. We have to get better if we’re going to stay in the game. So that’s why it’s important to understand this question of where great performance really comes from. Whether it’s for individuals or organizations, the basic principles are the same. You’ve written that a lot of organizations are not good in the area of developing employees for high performance. Would you please elaborate on that? Sure. In general, most companies just don’t do a very good job of what a lot of them call leadership development. Whatever you call it, they don’t do a very good job of developing employees. They want everybody to do their job well, and they figure they’ll just observe who does their job well and then give them bigger jobs. What I see happening in recent years is that a lot of companies are realizing that isn’t enough. They realize they need a good strong program of developing employees. They look to the handful of companies that have taken this seriously for a long time. And they’re all getting with the program now and trying to catch up. That’s in general. The specific issue is that the principles of deliberate practice that I talk about in the book seem to be completely forgotten at most organizations. When I say forgotten, I mean everybody sort of knows them: everybody understands when they’re watching a sports team or listening to a great musician how those people got so good—through the principles of deliberate practice. Yet when they get to work, they don’t apply those principles to individuals or to the organization. What I’m going to argue in my presentation is that the organizations that do apply those principles perform much, much better. The same principles apply to performance of individuals and organizations, and I’ll give examples of each. Why do you think that organizations are short-sighted in this area or just aren’t making the effort? In my experience, it’s because they feel they can’t afford to have people not performing. Deliberate practice is an activity separate from the actual performance of the work. There are ways to practice in the work, but real deliberate practice is an activity separate from the work. Again, when you look at sports and music, that’s obvious. Musicians may spend 95 percent of their time practicing and 5 percent performing; for an NFL football player it’s a similar ratio: 95 percent of his time practicing, 5 percent actually performing the activity that he gets paid for. But in business, we all feel that we can’t take time off from actually doing our work in order to practice for doing our work better. So most companies don’t do it. The best ones realize that it isn’t an expense when you do that; it’s an investment. And it pays off. A leap of faith is required the first time you start down that road. Even though you may be convinced, you don’t know for sure that it’s actually going to pay off. So a lot of managers just feel they can’t afford it. The best ones understand they not only can afford it, but they really have to do it. You’ve written that you’ve been surprised by strong interest in your book by some groups of people you assumed would already be aware of how best to improve their performance. Would you please give some examples? Sure. At the individual level, I got a call from the manager of the bookstore at the Juilliard School in New York to come in and sign copies of the book. I said, "Sure," but I thought, "If there’s one group of people in the world who do not need this book, it’s the students at the Juilliard School—they got there because they understand deeply everything I talk about in the book." The manager later told me that it’s the bestselling title they’ve ever carried in that store. So that began to tell me that even the people who understand these principles the best are the ones who want to understand them even better. They want to know how great performance works and why. A different example but similar in some ways: I was asked to talk to an audience of one thousand brain surgeons. I thought, "These are the smartest people you can think of, and they do this incredibly difficult thing." So I was worried about how that would go. Well, they loved hearing about what it takes to improve performance. Afterward, those brain surgeons were lined up out the door for me to sign their books. I thought, "This is telling us something—that the people who presumably understand these things got as good as they are because they keep wanting to get better. That’s an interesting lesson." With regard to organizations, I’ve had a few experiences that I’ll tell about at the Quest conference. A medical products company decided to prepare for the introduction of a new product using the principles, taking employees away from selling in order to practice and prepare. This was a gamble. You take them out of the field and train them while they’re doing deliberate practice. The results were almost literally off the charts. I’ll explain that in detail in my presentation. For those organizations whose leaders say, "We don’t have the resources to really invest in our employees, especially to take them off the front line," how would you make the argument to invest in their workforce? I would hope that it wouldn’t be a tough sell. When you look at the companies that are famous for investing in their workforces, they tend to be great performers. One objection that I’ve encountered in companies is managers saying that in today’s environment, young people especially are just not going to stay with them for long. "I can train them, but I’m training them for my competitors," they say. But then they discover, "If I don’t offer the training, I won’t attract the best people in the first place." The other thing they discover is that a lot of those people will stay longer than they expected them to because they like what the place is doing for them. You’re still going to lose some good people. That’s inevitable. But you’re going to get better people and you’re going to keep them longer than if you didn’t offer the development. So I think it’s actually an easy sell. What are some other things that you’re focusing on now-and in your next book-that may help organizations improve their performance? The title of the new book is Humans Are Underrated: What High Achievers Know That Brilliant Machines Never Will. It begins with the question, In a few years, what will people do better than computers? It turns out to be a very sobering question because the more you look into it, the more it looks like it’s going to be hard to find things that people do better than computers. Very intelligent people have said that artificial intelligence can threaten the existence of humanity. Even if you don’t think machines are going to rise up and kill all the humans, there are still mainstream people now who are thinking that for the first time in history, technology may actually eliminate some jobs faster than it creates new ones. So the question becomes, What will people do? What will be the high-value work, what will make organizations great and highly successful, and what will earn a rising living standard for people in a world where computers do more and more stuff—better, faster, cheaper than people can do that stuff? My answer is, Don’t look for the answer the way people have always done it, which is by asking, What is it that computers inherently can’t do? That won’t get us anywhere. Focus instead on what we as human beings are hard-wired to want to do with other people and get from other people—what is in our deepest nature that we want to do with one another and for one another? If we focus on that, then we’ll be doing stuff that will always have high value, which comes from our deepest and most essential human traits—developing empathy, working in groups, solving problems together, telling stories, building relationships. The best organizations now are focusing on exactly those things. We see empathy-development programs in particular at many organizations. The research on what makes groups effective—what makes teams effective—shows that it’s all about social sensitivity. It has little to do with the IQ of the team members. It really is important for organizations to understand this in order to perform better. To hear Colvin’s keynote presentation at the Baldrige Program’s Quest for Excellence® Conference on Wednesday, April 15, in Baltimore, MD, register for the conference now.

Posted by Harry Hertz, the Baldrige Cheermudgeon My sincere wish is that you will be the nozzle. But it sure is tempting to be the fire hose. Right now you are probably asking, what is Harry talking about? Has he gone off the deep end? Let me explain my concern, starting with the background. I recently read a blog post about the fire hose and the nozzle. The gist of the post was that in live and virtual communication we are too often the hose and too infrequently the nozzle. The "fire hose" person broadcasts everything that is on his or her mind. Like a fire hose, you are gushing everywhere and there is a lot of waste. The nozzle, on the other hand, is directed at exactly the place where water can do the most good. The same can be said for the focused communication of the "nozzle" person. She or he delivers the needed message with clarity and impact. We are just ten days away from the 27th Annual Quest for Excellence Conference. If you are at the conference, and I hope you will be, I can guarantee two outcomes. You will be energized by the systems of excellence that you hear about. And, you will come away with hundreds of ideas about how to improve your own organization. My question is will you be the fire hose or the nozzle when you return home? Sharing the energy and enthusiasm is great. Proposing hundreds of ideas is not. Take the time to digest and prioritize what improvements, innovations, or changes will have the greatest impact on your organization’s performance. Pick some low-hanging fruit, where results will be seen quickly. And then pick one or two bigger opportunities that will take longer, but will have significant potential impact on performance. Share those high priority ideas with the natural enthusiasm you will be bringing back from the conference. But please don’t restrict the fire hose analogy just to the Quest conference. Let me elaborate. I have a yard that takes several hours to mow on a garden tractor. It gives me lots of time to think. And thinking leads to ideas I like to share with my colleagues. I learned to share from the nozzle and not the hose. I realized this need to focus, when my colleagues starting asking me on Monday morning whether I had mowed. If I said yes, they either disappeared or had painful looks (maybe a little exaggeration here). Idea sharing, as with other organizational opportunities, needs prioritization. Too many ideas will be overwhelming and none will receive consideration. I hope to see you at the Quest conference! And please, leave the fire hose at home, when you return to your workplace!  

Posted by Dawn Marie Baldrige One of the Baldrige Program’s strategic advantages is its very engaged community. In fact, Baldrige not only depends on its dedicated volunteer workforce of examiners but on the community members that continue to support use of the Baldrige Excellence Framework and its Criteria by all organizations, big and small. This support stems from community members’ patriotism and sincere desire to help organizations in every sector succeed, from the schools that teach our children, the manufacturers that create the products we use everyday, the hospitals that care for our families, the service organizations that make our lives more pleasant, the small businesses that employ us, and the nonprofits that provide services in our own communities. To support the work of volunteers, the Baldrige Program has recently updated a set of PowerPoint files (slide set) and graphics that anyone may download free of charge and use in presentations, papers, etc. The 2015 slide set modules are Introduction to the Baldrige Program Introduction to the Baldrige Excellence Framework Baldrige Excellence Framework (Business/Nonprofit) Baldrige Excellence Framework (Education) Baldrige Excellence Framework (Health Care) The Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award Self-Assessing Your Organization with the Baldrige Excellence Framework Performance Excellence: A Systems Approach and Tools Baldrige Program Impacts Baldrige graphics free to download include Criteria overview frameworks for business/nonprofit, education, and health care; illustrations that depict learning and the maturation of processes; and a visual on the role of core values and concepts. Frequently asked questions related to Baldrige are also currently being updated. Thank you for the many ways that you use this slide set and graphics to spread word about the value of Baldrige.

Posted by Christine Schaefer Why is the Baldrige Excellence Framework beneficial for organizations in the education sector? "Education organizations are by nature complex systems," responds Lisa Muller, Jenks Public Schools Assistant Superintendent of Teaching and Learning. "Watching the buses run every afternoon as they deliver thousands of students from our school sites to their homes is a great reminder for me of the importance of systems thinking and process management to our success as an organization." Since Muller’s suburban Oklahoma school district received a Baldrige Award in 2005, its enrollment has grown from 9,300 to 11,450 students. During the past decade, Jenks Public Schools also has seen its students become more diverse, both ethnically and socioeconomically. And examples abound of how the district continues to benefit from its knowledge and use of the Baldrige framework. Said Muller, "The continuous-improvement efforts at Jenks Public Schools have allowed us to identify ways to improve the effectiveness of our instructional programs and delivery methods, reduce operational costs so that more resources can be shifted to classrooms (even during the recent years of cuts in education funding), and recruit and retain effective employees." Muller shared that cost savings achieved during the construction process for capital improvement projects completed last year helped the district add (to the original building proposals) a field house for basketball, volleyball, and wrestling activities. Both the new and older district facilities today are used frequently beyond school hours for wide-ranging community education offerings, including tuition-based classes ranging from driver’s education to ballroom dancing. "Profits from these programs are reinvested in our schools and used to support additional educational opportunities for students," said Muller. To help other organizations benefit similarly from a Baldrige approach to organizational improvement, Muller shared the following guidance on getting started. 1. Start small and build on early successes over time: "My top tip for organizations at this stage and people leading continuous-improvement efforts is to recognize the slow nature of this type of organizational change," said Muller. "There’s a reason Baldrige Award recipients talk about their journey rather than their race." 2. Take advantage of all the self-assessment tools and informational resources on the Baldrige Program’s website: Muller noted that many (free and easy-to-use) resources for beginners are available on the "New to Baldrige" page of the Baldrige Program’s website at http://www.nist.gov/baldrige/enter/new.cfm/. For example, this web page has links to the "Are We Making Progress?" surveys and the easyInsight survey tool, which can help organizations identify potential starting points for their improvement work. 3. Focus conversations around continuous improvement rather than "doing Baldrige." The Baldrige Criteria provide an excellent framework for driving organizational improvement, said Muller, but they are a means to an end, not the end goal itself. Muller also recommended the Organizational Profile as a "very useful starting point" for organizations new to a Baldrige approach to performance improvement. "The questions in this part of the Baldrige Criteria help organizations do two things: (1) create context by telling the story of who they are and what they do, and (2) identify potential areas of focus for continuous improvement efforts," she said. Muller explained that her district has used its Organizational Profile as the context for thinking about its performance in all areas. "Excellence in the 5 ‘A’s of Academics, Activities, Attitude, the Arts, and Athletics is one of the district’s core competencies," she added. "It represents our focus on educating the whole child, even in challenging economic times when many districts elected to cut fine arts and other elective programming." "To meet the changing nature of the first "A"—academics—we’re piloting a device-to-student ratio of 1:1 in our instructional technology plan," she added. "This year, all students in grades 9 through 12 have a Chromebook and access to a learning management system through which teachers deliver blended instruction that students can access at school and at home." This photo collage depicts the district’s focus on its "5 A’s." Image used with permission of Jenks Public Schools. Muller will present "Beginning the Baldrige Journey: First Steps Toward Performance Excellence" at the Baldrige Program’s 27th Annual Quest for Excellence® Conference. To learn from this and other sessions featuring role-model Baldrige Award recipients sharing best practices, register for the Quest for Excellence, April 12-15, in Baltimore, MD.  

Posted by Christine Schaefer As the sun was setting Sunday on one of the first balmy days of the year in Baltimore, Maryland, four role models officially received the nation’s highest award for organizations that have demonstrated excellent performance. Following are highlights of remarks conveyed at the Baldrige Award ceremony by senior leaders of each of the 2014 recipients. PricewaterhouseCoopers Public Sector Practice (McLean, Virginia) Pictured from left to right: National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) Acting Director Willie May, Baldrige Foundation Chair George Benson, PwC PSP US Public Sector Leader Scott McIntyre, PwC PSP US Public Sector Director/Baldrige Leader Allison Carter, and Commerce Department Deputy Secretary Bruce Andrews "We couldn’t be more thrilled," PwC US Public Sector Leader Scott McIntyre said in accepting his organization’s Baldrige Award. "The Baldrige Award is highly coveted and enormously respected by organizations in every industry and raises the profile of quality advancement in the U.S. and around the world," said McIntyre. "This is a big milestone for my team and for the broader organization PwC." McIntyre expressed gratitude for his organization’s culture, which "insists on quality and accepts risk taking in a high-quality manner." He thanked his team members who were present in the ceremony audience and all 1,100 employees of PwC Public Sector Practice. He also extended appreciation to the 195,000 PwC employees working in 157 countries with clients of the organization’s public sector and commercial sector financial services. "We’re thrilled to see what happens when you really put your focus on quality improvement, on really listening to your customers and your clients, setting your egos aside and trying new things in the name of the advancement of quality and innovation," said McIntyre. "We’re thrilled with the results, but we’re also delighted to see how we can help other companies in different industries learn from us, even as we learn from them," he added. "It’s an exciting time to be creating jobs and to be contributing to innovation in the United States." Hill Country Memorial (Fredericksburg, Texas) Pictured from left to right: NIST Acting Director Willie May, Baldrige Foundation Chair George Benson, Hill Country Memorial Chief Executive Officer Jayne E. Pope, Hill Country Memorial Executive Director of Business Intelligence Debbye Dooley, and Commerce Department Deputy Secretary Bruce Andrews Among the many workforce and community members Hill Country Memorial Chief Executive Officer Jayne E. Pope thanked as she accepted the hospital’s 2014 Baldrige Award: "All of you people with those cowbells" (who enthusiastically rang them during the award ceremony as the hospital’s name was called out from the stage). With visible emotion, Pope honored the personal sacrifices sometimes made by her organization’s employees and volunteers in carrying out their jobs of delivering health care and related services. She also expressed appreciation for the support of the organization’s "visionary board," its foundation, and the community. "We understand the importance of rural health care in America," said Pope. "And we believe rural health care is world-class." "We embraced the Baldrige Criteria as … a wise and trusted friend, and now we turn to it in everything we do," she said of the hospital’s journey to excellence. Pope also acknowledged the contributions of former Baldrige Award recipients: Their "transparency and sharing of best practices have made each of us better and really modeled the spirit of this award," she said. St. David’s HealthCare (Austin, Texas) Pictured from left to right: NIST Acting Director Willie May, Baldrige Foundation Chair George Benson, St. David’s HealthCare President and Chief Executive Officer David Huffstutler, St. David’s HealthCare Vice President of Quality David Thomsen, and Commerce Department Deputy Secretary Bruce Andrews "For the past few years, St. David’s HealthCare has been using the Baldrige Criteria for Performance Excellence to improve as an organization," recounted David Huffstutler, the organization’s president and chief executive officer, in accepting its 2014 Baldrige Award Sunday evening. "This has been an extraordinary journey as we have come together around a unified goal of becoming a better health care system." Huffstutler thanked St. David’s HealthCare’s partner organizations—HCA, St. David’s Foundation, and Georgetown Health Foundation; its community members serving on the organization’s hospital boards; and the 8,100 employees and more than 2,000 medical staff members. "If it weren’t for every one of these individuals and their unwavering commitment to excellence, we obviously wouldn’t be here today," he said. "Going through the Baldrige process has been truly transformational for us, and it continues to make us better," said Huffstutler. "That’s really what the Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award is all about. It’s about measuring ourselves against the highest-performing organizations in the nation and applying what we learn along the way to help us improve." "It’s humbling to be recognized as a role model for organizations across the country," he said, adding that his organization plans to continue raising the bar as it is committed to performance improvement. "Aristotle once said, ‘We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.’ On behalf of everyone at St. David’s HealthCare, I want to thank the Baldrige program for helping us to instill the habit of excellence in our organization." Elevations Credit Union (Boulder, Colorado) Pictured from left to right: NIST Acting Director Willie May, Baldrige Foundation Chair George Benson, Elevations Credit Union Chief Executive Officer Gerry Agnes, Elevations Credit Union Senior Vice President of Enterprise Performance Pete Reicks, and Commerce Department Deputy Secretary Bruce Andrews In accepting his organization’s award at Sunday’s ceremony, Elevations Credit Union Chief Executive Officer Gerry Agnes told of how the nonprofit began its Baldrige improvement journey during the widespread financial crisis in 2009. "For a small financial institution, to enter that crisis was a daunting task," he said. But "our board of directors had a great vision." "We chose the Baldrige framework, which really helped us ask some very important questions—questions that all leaders should be asking their organization," stated Agnes. "Over the course of six years, we improved our organization substantially," he said. And he credited the credit union’s 350 employees for making "this effort come to fruition." Agnes surprised the audience and elicited enthusiastic applause for his tribute to employees’ loved ones. After calling out many by their first names, he explained to the audience, "They’re the wives, husbands, children, spouses, significant others. They’re the ones who support us and the inspiration for us." Addressing those loved ones, he said, "So we salute you and thank you."  

Posted by Christine Schaefer "If we’re not getting better faster than our competitors, then we’re losing ground." (Scott McIntyre, PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) Public Sector Practice [PSP] US Leader) "Values are really the culture of our organization." (David Huffstutler, St. David’s HealthCare President and Chief Executive Officer) "How we live [our organization’s core competencies] differentiates us in our industry and in our market." (Jayne E. Pope, Hill Country Memorial Chief Executive Officer) "To make progress … we had to get to the source of truth. My measure of my own success as a leader: "Have I created a safe environment for my team to handle the truth?" (Gerry Agnes, Elevations Credit Union Chief Executive Officer) Those are some of the insights and lessons shared by senior leaders of the 2014 Baldrige Leaders of 2014 Baldrige Award recipient organizations and Commerce Department Deputy Secretary Bruce Andrews watch the procession of the United States Joint Service Color Guard during the Baldrige Award Ceremony on Sunday, April 12, 2015. Award recipients during the leadership plenary of the Baldrige Program’s Quest for Excellence® Conference this week. Following are detailed highlights from those leadership presentations. Scott McIntyre, PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) Public Sector Practice (PSP) PSP is one of six businesses within the broader financial services firm of PwC, one of the largest privately held organizations in the world operating in 157 countries, McIntyre explained. PSP operates globally and in the United States, and he has responsibility for its U.S. and overseas operations. From the start of his presentation, McIntyre spoke of his firm’s need to attract "great talent." In doing so, he said, it seeks to build a business that is widely recognized as a top performer by third-party endorsements, which now include the Baldrige Award. "Being recognized … is very important to us because our brand is very important," he said. "We were very fortunate to learn a few weeks ago that PwC’s brand at the global level is ranked number-two in the global brand health index." According to McIntyre, the PSP organizational structure is designed to put the customer first and thus reflects "the investments we make in products and services and in people" to serve its clients’ unique needs. To realize its vision to be recognized as the public sector’s clear choice for driving effectiveness across federal agencies, the organization’s leadership focuses on three objectives, said McIntyre. One is building out a leadership capability. This includes understanding competitive dynamics, contemplating changes in the industry, and setting the tone and vision. The second is making sure it furnishes the tools to its employees to support its vision. And the third is grooming future leaders. Fulfilling those three objectives is his job, McIntyre said. He described the organization’s "leadership pipeline" as beginning with its annual intern event at a Disney amusement park. The experience emphasizes teamwork, collaboration, and sharing. "These are not just core values of our firm," he added, "They’re core tenets of our leadership program." McIntyre said one of the unique aspects of his organization’s leadership development program is its dual focus on grooming people to be effective leaders whether they stay with the organization or go on to other organizations—"whether they’re in PwC or [become] clients of PwC." A second unique leadership practice of his organization, he said, is "the way we look at what we want to cultivate" in employees. Corporate efforts to develop leaders tend to focus on rewarding performance, he said, but his organization has learned that exclusively rewarding "performers" (those "who bring in money every day") can drive away "producers" (those "people who produce big ideas … who are true visionaries"). To attract and retain people who can help the organization be competitive for the long term, McIntyre’s organization changed its leadership system to put more emphasis on supporting visionaries even as it maintains a focus on high-performing contributors to the organization’s current success. McIntyre also shared some of his organization’s learning and improvements as a result of its adoption of the Baldrige framework and process. "Using Baldrige to improve was, I think, one of the smartest things we did in our business," he said. "It really gave us a touchstone, it really gave us an opportunity to learn about [how the Baldrige framework and criteria for excellence] could be adapted to our organization … and to constantly measure ourselves and evaluate how we’re doing." For his organization, he explained, the process was about "taking an organization that was very successful in its marketplace and that’s growing very dramatically… and [making] changes." Among those changes, the organization refined its core competencies last year. For example, he said the organization recognized that talent recruitment and development "had to be a core competency" for the firm to remain successful. Another change was to completely overhaul its strategic planning process. Clients’ ever-changing demands and competitive pressures made it necessary for the organization to be able to rapidly develop strategy on a situation-specific basis, he explained.   David Huffstutler, St. David’s HealthCare One of the largest health systems in the state of Texas, St. David’s HealthCare encompasses six hospitals, four free-standing emergency departments, four urgent-care clinics, and six ambulatory surgery centers. It also is associated with 76 physician practices and affiliated with six hospitals in outlying areas. It is the third-largest employer in the Austin and central Texas area, with more than 7,400 employees, supported by nearly 2,000 physicians. St. David’s HealthCare has a unique business model as a joint venture partnership between the for-profit hospital management company HCA and two nonprofit community foundations, St. David’s Foundation and Georgetown Health Foundation. This partnership has been in place since 1996. "It’s really a very unique business model that’s been great for the community," said Huffstutler. Beyond the capital and operating funds generated, surplus profits go to shareholders of the management company and to both local foundations, he said. In 2014 alone, they contributed $50 million to their communities, he added. The organization’s mission of providing exceptional care "is the basis of everything we do," said Huffstutler. Four years ago, it set a vision to be the finest care and service organization in the world. While that vision is "clearly aspirational," said Huffstutler, "we really wanted to reach for the brass ring." The organization decided to adopt the Baldrige framework as a way "to really know whether we were getting better and … benchmark ourselves against organizations, not just in our industry but across industries," said Huffstutler. "St. David’s HealthCare had not had a very sophisticated performance improvement methodology prior to this time," he said. "We knew how to execute well, but we didn’t have a framework." With the Baldrige approach, the organization gained "a disciplined and organized process to get better as an organization, external expertise, and someone who can give us feedback on where we’re going as an organization." Since embracing the Baldrige improvement process, the organization learned to use the leadership system to take advantage of its core competencies: operating discipline, a culture of excellence, physician collaboration, and clinical expertise. For example, in recent years the organization has applied its operating discipline to prioritize opportunities to pursue, develop action plans, allocate resources, and track programs. He described the organization’s critical success factors as follows: Improve understanding of mission, vision, and values Communicate commitment to performance excellence "Expand the circle" (educating the workforce on why improvement is important and creating internal experts to help with improvement efforts) Ensure systemwide alignment in measurement and performance (making sure that departmental goals lined up to organization-level goals) A key success factor, Huffstutler emphasized, "is all about the culture of the organization—it’s all about believing in what you do, understanding that you’re involved in a higher purpose." Therefore, his organization focuses on driving home its mission, vision, values, and goals through "activities around making sure our employees can understand those and recite those, but more important, be able to convey" them in their daily work. The organization’s performance dashboard reflects a balanced approach with measures in three areas: customer loyalty, exceptional care, and financial strength. "Making sure we’re good stewards" of resources is his organization’s responsibility to the community, Huffstutler said. Stressing the value of the continuous improvement process, he asserted that his organization has a responsibility to keep improving and that its patients expect it to do so: "We owe it to them, so we have to get better." In the highly regulated health care industry, he added, the pursuit of excellence is also important because of both incentives and penalties tied to health care quality measures. Coming next: Insights from CEOs Jayne Pope of Hill Country Memorial and Gerry Agnes of Elevations Credit Union

Posted by Harry Hertz, the Baldrige Cheermudgeon In the recently released Conference Board Report, CEO Challenge 2015, sustainability was listed among the top five challenges for the first time. Although it was in the top five, there were regional differences, between the U.S. at challenge number 10 and China and India at 3 and 4, respectively. According to the United Nations, "Sustainability calls for a decent standard of living for everyone today without compromising the needs of future generations." According to the Conference Board, CEO priorities in the sustainability arena include developing socially/environmentally conscious products and having sustainability as part of their business’ brand identity. Baldrige treats sustainability as a holistic concept related to overall societal responsibilities. I encourage all organizations to take this holistic approach. Examples mentioned in the Criteria for Performance Excellence include: reducing your carbon footprint, resource conservation, use of renewable energy sources and recycled water, increased use of audio and video-conferencing to conserve multiple resources, use of enlightened labor practices, strengthening local community services (including education, health care, and emergency preparedness), and improving practices of your trade or business associations. Societal responsibility is one of the  Core Values and Concepts that are embedded in the Criteria and form the basis for them. Societal responsibility starts with an organization’s leaders being role models for and stressing the organization’s commitment to societal well-being. To be a role model organization, leadership also entails influencing other organizations, private and public, to partner for these purposes. And finally, managing societal responsibilities means your organization uses appropriate measures of success and that your leaders take responsibility for those measures. How does your organization perform in the big picture of societal responsibilities and sustainability?

Read the first part of this series that features 2014 Baldrige Award recipients PricewaterhouseCoopers Public Sector Practice and St. David’s HealthCare. Posted by Dawn Marie Bailey Leaders of 2014 Baldrige Award recipients and Commerce Department Deputy Secretary Bruce Andrews watch the procession of the United States Joint Service Color Guard at the Baldrige Award Ceremony on Sunday, April 12, 2015 Award recipients during the leadership plenary of the Baldrige Program’s Quest for Excellence® Conference this week. Following are detailed highlights from those leadership presentations. Jayne Pope, CEO, Hill Country Memorial Hospital There is a tourist attraction just north of town—a large granite formation called Enchanted Rock. According to Jayne Pope, CEO of 2014 Baldrige Award winner Hill Country Memorial, that rock represents the history of the nonprofit, rural hospital in the hill country of Texas and its climb to serve its community, getting better and better year after year. "Any one of you who has made a climb knows that some of the most beautiful vistas are along the way," she said. "We at Hill County Memorial have been able to turn, and we have seen some beautiful sights, some wonderful accomplishments. Yet, we can’t linger, because we know as leaders, the real work is what lies ahead. . . .  Once you have committed to a climb . . . you are obligated to find the best, safest, most efficient road to the top. . . . We have integrated the Baldrige Criteria to help us get through our climb." Pope said the independent, non-tax-supported hospital is the economic and civic backbone of its communities. Opened in 1971, community members literally collected coins in mason jars to start the hospital, with over 90 percent participating in the fund drive. Hill Country continues today as a center for caring and compassion, with every workforce member appreciating its "legacy of trust" with the community and demonstrating very impressive results: distinction as a 100-top U.S. hospital four years in a row, five times in its history number one in the nation for patient satisfaction physician and employee satisfaction in the top decile Said Pope, "The Baldrige Criteria are what has propelled these results." The hospital answered its community obligation not by thinking small but with "a powerful promise," she said. Adopting the "proactive, innovative attitude of [its] founders," the hospital redefined its mission in two words: "Remarkable Always," with "remarkable" defined as performing in the top decile in America—and that’s across all hospitals, large and small, urban and rural, every hospital industry standard. Hill Country also lives by a motto, "keep it simple and remember what we are here for": an aspirational and brief vision ("Empower others. Create healthy.") and a measurable and clear mission. "Before we engaged with the Baldrige Criteria, we thought that we wanted to be the best community hospital anywhere," Pope said. "And then we started to use the Baldrige Criteria, and we started to dream bigger. We thought about being the best hospital in the nation." Pope shared leadership lessons that Hill Country has learned: Developing services tailored for its "independent-natured" community in and outside the hospital, with services such as hospice, home health, a farmer’s market for healthy choices, community industries for free health screenings, and a wellness center. Creating core competencies that differentiate the hospital in its industry and market and really living those competencies. Building relationships with patients and staff. Pope said the role of a leader is to remove obstacles for team members so that they can go above and beyond to serve patients; "It’s my job as a leader to serve the people who serve the people." Integrating the values into everything that we do. Pope said patients know when staff are living the values, as evidenced through strong customer engagement results. As CEO, Pope personally screens physicians to ensure that their personal values align with the hospital’s values, and all team members are coached to ensure their work aligns with the values. "Not a day goes by at Hill Country Memorial when you will not hear, ‘How does that fit with our values?'" she said. Being accountable to the mission. Pope defined the core competency of "execution" as really living the mission; setting a big picture goal, determining how to measure it, and monitoring it along the way. "As leaders, we believe we have the accountability to build a culture that we’re all on the same page, . . . so that’s we’re able to be working in sync." Being transparent. Pope said leaders share the desire to always get better for the sake of others. In a changing market, this is done by holding leaders accountable and ensuring transparency with the board, community,  physicians, and workforce. "The leadership system is about doing right," she said. In 2007, Pope said the hospital looked at where it performed against other top hospitals. "We weren’t great," she said. "We recognized that we needed a framework to help get us to the top, so we chose the Baldrige framework. . . . Year after year after year, we got better, until now we’re in the top 1 percent in the nation." In regards to the climb to always get better, Pope said, "We’re not perfect. We’re not at the summit. We have opportunities to learn. . . . .We can’t linger, our real work is ahead." Gerry Agnes, CEO, Elevations Credit Union In 1953, 12 individuals at the University of Colorado contributed about $50 to a cash box; individuals making deposits at 2014 Baldrige Award winner Elevations Credit Union now number about 108,000. Defining a credit union as a nonprofit, financial cooperative, CEO Gerry Agnes said the community-based organization may be small but competes with some of the largest financial organizations in the world. That was one thing he said he learned from Baldrige: identify who you benchmark/compete against. Credit unions have about 6% of the market, but that does not mean they can’t compete "mightily," he said. Agnes shared lessons he’s learned from leading the credit union on its Baldrige quality journey, which started in 2008 with the question, "Just how good are we?" Of course, the year was 2008, the midst of the financial crisis. Although one in four residents in Elevation’s primary market was a member of the credit union, capital wasn’t growing nearly as quickly as it was for competitors, neither was there significant growth for the credit union in members or assets. "Many people were asking us why would you spend financial capital and human resources to undertake [the challenge of adopting the Baldrige framework] in the middle of a crisis. And we thought to ourselves, we’re really at a fork in the road," Agnes said. "If we take the wrong fork, we might end up in mediocrity. . . . We wanted to make sure we understood who we are, where we’re going, and how we are going to get there." Agnes shared some of his leadership lessons: Build your foundation with the core values and vision; ask how are you going to get there? Make adopting the Baldrige framework about a journey to excellence not winning the award. Create a safe environment to be honest. Citing the line "you can’t handle the truth" from the movie A Few Good Men, Agnes said he was reminded that "in organizations, truth is often really hard to handle. . . . If I had one goal to measure my success, it would be, have I created an environment with my team that is safe, where we can have brutally honest conversations about salient matters that will benefit our members, our employees, our community." Get input and buy-in from all employees and the board of directors. "At the end of the day, employees want to be seen, heard, and valued," he said. "People were starting to see that we valued their input and actually took action on it. They realized it was safe to ask [difficult] questions. That enabled us to persevere." Acknowledge the "pain curve." Agnes said the credit union thought it was doing pretty well, but then employees really started looking at the data and realized they may not be doing as well as they thought. "It’s quite remarkable that over time our perceptions and reality got closer and closer," he said. Celebrate victories, large and small. "Relish every one of them," Agnes said. "Because if you celebrate with your team, you rejuvenate their spirits and keep that momentum going."  Actively plan. Agnes said Elevations is very proud of its "operational rhythm," which includes actively managing its strategic plan: "Our plan is not something that sits back and collects dust." With honest conversations and a culture permeated by continuous improvement, Agnes said Elevation’s quality journey got some momentum, and the results were clear. By 2014, Elevations had seen 2 to 1 growth in capital, 6 to 1 growth in membership, and 2 to 1 growth in assets. This "stark contrast of results stemmed from the Baldrige framework," he said. Member-centricity was our winning strategy, with fully engaged employees and a very loyal member base, Agnes said; the "financial results are the byproduct of employees serving our members and doing a great job." He added, "My job as CEO is to turn this organization over to the next CEO in better shape than it is today, and through the Baldrige framework, we [will be] able to do that."

Posted by Dawn Marie Bailey Author Jim Collins operates a management laboratory in Boulder, Co., where he conducts, researches, teaches, and consults with executives from the corporate and social sectors. Last week, Jim Collins, an author who has sold more than 10 million book copies worldwide, was a featured guest on the radio show "Performance Excellence USA." Co-hosts Julia Gabaldon, president/CEO of Quality New Mexico, and Steve Keene, partner in charge, Moss Adams LLC, and chair-elect for Quality New Mexico, asked Collins how his findings have changed over time, about the importance of discipline and agility, and how great leaders make decisions in chaotic times. They also explored Collins’s take on how the Baldrige Excellence Framework is a "SMAC" recipe: a specific, methodical, and consistent leadership approach. Following are highlights of the conversation: Going back to your book Good to Great, what would be different today about your findings and conclusions? Twenty-five years ago, I asked what separates a great enterprise from a mediocre one, and the principles then have not changed much today. What makes a great enterprise tick are the enduring principles of the hedgehog concept, level-5 leadership, first getting the right people on the bus, a culture of discipline, confrontation of the brutal facts, and the building of momentum. What I feel really, deeply passionate about is the idea that in a world of tremendous change, we really need some principles that we can build upon. Discipline is a common theme in your research. You have been quoted as saying, "I see the Baldrige process as a powerful set of mechanisms for disciplined people engaged in disciplined thought and taking disciplined action to create great organizations that produce exceptional results." Can you elaborate on that? The blend of being able to put creativity and discipline together really distinguishes any kind of outstanding enterprise. Think of it as you have disciplined people who engage in disciplined thought and take disciplined action. When you stand back and examine how somebody really begins to build momentum, that’s what they’re doing. The interesting thing about building a culture of discipline is the idea that in the end almost fanatic levels of discipline—but not rigidity—doing the things that produce the best results with great rigor—separate excellent-from-mediocre enterprises. If I do something a little bit better consistently over a very long period of time, it compounds to a gigantic result, like pushing a fly wheel. You start pushing in an intelligent and consistent direction, and after a lot of effort, you finally get a big, giant, creaky turn, but the discipline then comes. You build more and more momentum, and then you get this great, powerful, cumulative effect of the fly wheel, but to say, "Oh that’s too hard, we need a new fly wheel," that’s a lack of discipline. The real discipline comes in the compounding effect. One of the things that always struck me about the Baldrige process is it’s a way of institutionalizing a culture of discipline. It’s entirely the antithesis of what’s dysfunctional with disciplinarians: geniuses with a thousand helpers who personally discipline people. We’re talking about making an entire cultural ethos where everyone is engaged in a systematic, methodical, consistent approach to making things work better day upon day, week upon week, year upon year, over a long period of time. You have written, "Scale innovation to blend creativity with discipline." Tell us more. We wanted to research the role that innovation plays in helping enterprises and companies become big winners in environments that are full of chaos and change. Innovation is definitely important, but it’s kind of a threshold item. What we really found that is more important is the ability to scale innovation based upon an empirical assessment of what works, or what we call fire bullets and fire cannon balls. Essentially think of it as you have a ship bearing down on you. One approach would be to take all of your gun powder, put it in a big cannon ball, and fire it at the attacking ship, hoping it hits, but then it misses. You’re out of gun powder and in trouble. But you could take a different approach, which is to put a little bit of gun powder into a bullet, and fire it at that ship. It misses, but it takes the right direction, so you take another little bit of gun powder and fire closer. Now you hit the side of the ship. You know that if you put all of your resources into the next cannon ball, it’s going to hit because you calibrated it; you have empirical validation. What we found is that the companies that don’t do well either don’t fire enough bullets to discover what will work to hedge against uncertainty, fire big uncalibrated cannon balls that splash in the ocean and leave them exposed, or fail to convert an empirically validated bullet into a big giant cannon ball. When you take a small innovation that worked and scale it into something really big, that is what distinguishes the really great success stories. In chaotic times, what turns the odds in a leader’s favor? A triad of behaviors are used by great business leaders: fanatic discipline, empirical creativity, and productive paranoia. Fanatic discipline is the notion of a leader taking a 20-mile march, whether conditions are good or bad, as long as progress is being made. This leader exhibits self-control in a world that is out of control, and therefore he/she will be the master of his/her own results. The great irony is the more the world is out of control, the more you need to be within self-control. Empirical creativity is betting on something innovative but making sure that it is empirically validated so you don’t leave yourself exposed if it doesn’t work. Productive paranoia is about learning from mistakes but understanding that the only mistakes you can learn from are the ones you survive. What we found is that as the world becomes more chaotic and uncertain, you can find yourself exposed. The leaders who do very well in these environments, particularly entrepreneurial leaders, have what we call productive paranoia. If you’re a productive paranoid, you say I feel very fortunate that my glass is full—not half full—but I’m aware that it could change at any moment, so I better be prepared. These leaders carry three-to-ten times the normal amount of cash to assets—just in case things go bad. This means always staying away from the risks that could kill you when you’re going to go do great, big, dangerous, creative, adventurous things; you’re going to do those things but in a way that you are guaranteed to survive the bad luck events along the way that could knock you out of the game. When you put these three habits together, you get the kind of leadership behaviors that distinguish people that do exceptionally well in chaotic environments. What is your advice on handling large amounts of change and the speed of that change? Leaders should get a recipe that works, and once you have a recipe that works, you don’t want to throw that recipe out every two years; you want to evolve that recipe. This is analogous to the U.S. Constitution. You wouldn’t have wanted the founders to have written a constitution that needs to be thrown out and rewritten every 10 years. The whole idea is that you need to have very disciplined evolution of your constitution, and that’s where the founders came up with the amendment mechanism. We have found that the great company builders thought the same way: I’m going to build a culture on a set of values that work, but I have to allow them to evolve, and I’m going to do that through a disciplined evolution rather than just a reaction to the current fads. A "SMAC" recipe is specific, methodical, and consistent just like the Baldrige process. Regarding the speed of decision making, we asked whether the people who decide faster and act faster always win, and the answer is no. There is that old saying that you are either the quick or the dead, but sometimes, the quick are the dead. The question is not fast or slow. The question is how much time do you have before your risk profile changes. If I’m sitting on the side of a hill and there is a forest fire, I better move fast because my risk profile is changing by the minute. Or let’s suppose you have a slow-developing disease where there may be a lot of different kinds of treatments to consider. First thing you might ask is, "How much time do I have until my risk profile changes?" Take that time to go through a very disciplined analysis to determine what would be the best course of treatment. Approaches, like the Baldrige framework, help organizations get better, and the concept of agility is paramount. Can you elaborate on the importance of agility? One thing that we know for certain is that the signature of mediocrity is not an unwillingness to change. Now if you don’t change, don’t have an ability to have an agile response to the changes in your world, you will become irrelevant. But the true signature of mediocrity is chronic inconsistency. It’s when you have no sense of a recipe, no sense of a disciplined adherence to an approach that you then apply with great imagination. There are two sides of a coin: on the one side is the fanatic discipline to really, really follow a recipe. A successful coach may evolve a winning program by improving based on the people involved and being very agile. The flip side of the coin involves luck. What we found through research is that luck doesn’t make great winners by itself, but what does contribute mightily is getting a high return on luck. When an unexpected luck event happens, your ability to recognize it, zoom out, make an adjustment, and then zoom back in and aggressively implement it, is how you get a higher return on luck. The question isn’t whether we’re going to get luck in life, it’s what you do with the luck. That incredible attention to a SMAC recipe with an ability to adjust and get a high return on unexpected luck; that combination is what separates those who end up being ten times better than others. Listen to the entire 40-minute conversation with Collins from the radio show Performance Excellence USA: https://qualitynewmexico.org/fileadmin/pxusa/PXUSA_for_sun_4-12-015.mp3  

By Christine Schaefer If you want to foster talent and ultimately grow leaders in your organization, "culture is key." That’s what you can learn from Baldrige Award-winning Elevations Credit Union. And that was a core message of the organization’s chief operating officer Jay Champion and chief human resources officer Annette Matthies as they recently shared best practices to support, engage, and develop employees during the Baldrige Program’s annual Quest for Excellence® conference. Elevations Credit Union Leaders Share Workforce Practices at the Baldrige Program’s 27th Quest for Excellence Conference. The Boulder, Colorado-based nonprofit started out in 1952 as a small credit union on the campus of Colorado University. Today it has 332 employees and serves more than 106,000 customers at 11 branches. Yet an employee interviewed on video said the organization "still feels small" due to its cohesive culture. Using skier skill levels as an analogy, Champion and Matthies defined the credit union’s performance levels for workforce-focused practices as follows: Beginner: Invigorating our culture Intermediate: Differentiating through training Advanced: Nurturing talent Expert: Growing leaders Beginner Level: Invigorating the Culture After Elevations embraced the Baldrige Excellence Framework to improve its performance several years ago, the organizational culture was an initial focus area. Elevations already had defined its mission, vision, and values when it began using the Baldrige framework, explained Matthies. But those foundational elements of culture were not well-known by employees, she said. "I couldn’t tell you what the values were back in 2009," she admitted. Integrity. Respect. Passionate. Creativity. Driven by Excellence. Today it would be difficult, if not impossible, for Elevations employees not to be familiar with those core values. They are printed on employees’ badges, visible on employees’ computer screen savers, incorporated into new-employee orientation, and used during the hiring process as a screen for job applicants’ "fit" with the organizational culture, said Champion. What’s more, 25 percent of employees’ performance evaluation is based on their adherence to the organization’s core values. The core values matter so much that the organization has let some employees go for not adhering to them, said Champion. "When you do that," he pointed out, "you show what’s important." At the same time, having fun and volunteering in the community are supported by the organization’s vision. That vision includes the statements "We are known for the good work we do in the community," and "We are sought out as THE preferred employer." "We take our fun seriously," said Champion, adding that Elevations has found that this "drives results" in the areas of both employee and customer engagement. Having fun at work improves employees’ engagement, which leads to greater customer loyalty, he said. Because "volunteering is a big part of who we are," according to Matthies, every Elevations employee gets two paid days off from work to volunteer in the community. Last year alone, Elevations employees performed 4,000 hours of community service. Champion said this has been a draw for millennial-age employees. Intermediate Level: Differentiating through Training Results for annual employee surveys in 2011 and 2012 showed that Elevations needed a better staff training program. According to Champion, the training overhaul that followed was "the equivalent of a heart transplant." The result is a month-long training program with a "Mock Branch 2.0" simulated work environment for new hires. At the end of each training week, a live assessment is conducted to measure participants’ learning. "We invest four whole working weeks in every employee’s training," stressed Champion. And "it wasn’t cheap," said Matthies of the $400,000 Elevations invested to build the intensive onboarding program. But training improvements confirmed by "hard data" show the return on the organization’s investment, she affirmed. Advanced and Expert Levels: Nurturing Talent and Growing Leaders Elevations supports employees’ ongoing development by investing in their professional certifications and providing individual coaching for both performance improvement and career development. "Millennials love this," said Matthies. "They want more frequent feedback than older employees [want]." The current improvement focus, she said, is to ensure that all employees feel that their supervisors take an interest in helping them advance their careers. "We’re going to hold supervisors accountable to having development conversations," she said. To advance performance in what Champion referred to as the "final skiing lesson," the objective of Elevations’ practices to develop employees is "growing leaders." Reflecting the organization’s Employee Value Proposition (see graphic), the focus is on "building careers, not just jobs," he said. The Employee Value Proposition of Elevations Credit Union, 2014 Baldrige Award Recipient