The Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award is named on the name of Malcolm Baldrige, who was the Secretary of Commerce from 1981 till 1987 when he died due to a tragic incident. He served and benefited the government through his managerial excellence that helped increase the effectiveness and efficiency of the government. The award was created through the actions of the National Productivity Advisory Committee. Ever since the introduction of this award, it is now given through the cooperation of the American Society for Quality and NIST, both of whom are under contractual basis to administer the award. (Wapedia, 2009)
Since in this era of global economy, the provision of (Reynolds, 1999) quality goods and services by the U.S organizations has become a matter of survival, and no choice. So the basic purposes of the award is to recognize the organizations of the United States in the health care, business, and education sectors. The performance of these sectors is measured in terms of the standards established, quality strategies where promotion of quality awareness and strategic planning for quality is seen as a strong characteristic. The Malcolm Baldridge National Quality Award is not only a contest, in fact is a tool for recognizing the business excellence among the organizations. Any U.S for-profit organization can compete for this award; they can be: manufacturing companies, services companies, or small businesses with fewer than 500 full-time employees. Those companies who win this award deliver goods and services that are of great quality and competitive with the best in the world. Organizations need to apply the crucial principles of Total Quality Management (TQM) to every phase of their business. Malcolm Baldrige award includes the criteria of having performance excellence, firm leadership, designing of error prevention systems, suitable strategic planning, customer focus, trained employees who focus on quality, and emphasizing on continuous improvement in all management systems and processes.
The benefits of the award are numerous; it helps the organizations and as well as the country. The National Quality award improves the companies capabilities, performance practices, and its results, facilitates the sharing of information through effective communication. Moreover, the company who strives for and achieves this award improves its image in the market, increases its competitiveness and gain an upper hand over its competitors, provides greater value to its customers and shareholders, and improves its organizational and personal learning. Not only this, those firms who achieve this award are automatically elevated to the list of most competitive and quality providing firms of the world, hence resulting in their increased reputation throughout the world. And this can have further advantages for those firms; the image would be improved, certainty and stability would be there, along with the increased willingness of investors and customers to invest and purchase respectively.
Therefore, the striving for and achieving the award can totally change the organizations’ fate and competitiveness. Since the latest developments and technologies have made the actors in the business field to run much faster than before and be one hand beyond than their competitors in order to survive, there is no doubt that these types of awards create motivation among the organizations to bring on the increased methods, strategies, and implement them in such a way that would benefit them among their competitors, either locally or globally. Moreover, these types of awards automatically force the companies to achieve it by becoming a springboard to help companies develop and implement effective quality and performance strategies.
Reference
Baldrige National Quality Program – NIST.The Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Improvement Act of 1987 – Public Law 100-107. Web.
Reynolds. P. K. (1999). The Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award. University of Indianapolis.
Wikipedia: The Free Encyclopedia. Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award.