(WCLS)Baldrige User's Guide: Organization Diagnosis, Design, and Transformation (Updated for 2011 and 2012)

By John Latham and John Vinyard

"I wholeheartedly endorse "The Baldrige User's Guide" written extremely well by John Latham and John Vinyard. They have taken a systems approach and have provided a visual version of the Baldrige Criteria and made it simple enough for even beginners to understand. We have used this book as a guide in driving Business Excellence in our organization. I recommend this book to every manager who is committed to organizational excellence. A must on every desktop." G. Jagannathan, Executive Vice President, Global Head of Business Excellence, and Leadership and Governance Process Design Tata Consultancy Services Limited "Infosys has used the Baldrige Criteria as a business model and improvement approach for over 10 years. The Baldrige User's Guide is helpful to understand this model, whether you are just starting out or are a seasoned user. This book provides explanations, methods, and real-life examples to help you make improvements that will move your organization towards world class performance." Satyendra Kumar, Senior Vice President Infosys Technologies Ltd. "The Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award (MBNQA) provides us with the most rigorous and holistic criteria for performance excellence. We have used the Baldrige Users Guide in concert with MBNQA because it provides excellent examples how organizations translate the criteria and practical tools to identify performance gaps that help guide our journey of continuous improvement." John C. Timmerman, former Corporate Vice President, Operations The Ritz-Carlton Hotel Company, L.L.C., 1992 & 1999 Baldrige Recipient "The Baldrige Users Guide is a great resource for any organization that is using the Baldrige Criteria as their business model. We used it at Poudre Valley Health System during our journey, and are proud that examples of several of our approaches are used in this edition." Priscilla Nuwash, MBA, Director, Process Improvement Poudre Valley Health System, 2008 Baldrige Recipient "The Baldrige User's Guide has enabled us to adopt a critical systems approach. This disciplined framework helped us better understand the criteria linkages, identify gaps, and prioritize opportunities for improvement fostering our organizational excellence journey." Eric Franks, Manager, Technology & Quality Assurance PRO-TEC Coating Company, 2007 Baldrige Recipient "This Baldrige user's guide gives a visual and plain English version of the Baldrige Criteria for Excellence. It is enormously helpful in understanding what the Baldrige Examiners are looking for and in giving examples of how other organizations have answered these requirements." Nancy G. Pratt, RN, MS, Senior Vice President of Clinical Effectiveness Sharp HealthCare, 2007 Baldrige Recipient "For us at SSM Health Care, Baldrige has provided three essential things: a focus, a framework, and discipline. We now focus on the things that matter most to our patients. We look at our organization through the broad framework of Baldrige. And we have the discipline to stop doing things just because we've always done them. This book will be an enormous help to organizations that are truly interested in improving the work they do. It is an outstanding resource for any organization that is pursuing performance excellence." Sister Mary Jean Ryan, FSM, President/CEO SSM Health Care, 2002 Baldrige Recipient "Quality New Mexico endorses the Baldrige User's Guide. Through their book John Vinyard and John Latham have made the Baldrige criteria understandable to the novice. Quality New Mexico has used it as a reference in its development of workshops and materials." Julia Gabaldon, President/CEO Quality New Mexico

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1118101480
• ISBN13: 9781118101483
• Release Date: May 2011
• Publisher: Wiley
• Length: 644 Pages
• Weight: 3.50 lbs.
• Dimensions: 11.0" x 1.4" x 8.5"

Customer Reviews

Excellent aid for aspiring organizations or examiners

Anyone contemplating responding to the Baldrige Criteria should have this book in their library. Baldrige examiners can also use it as an aid in writing their assessments but should not replace the actual Criteria guidelines as stated in each year's "Performance for Performance Excellence." It is useful for linkages between Categories, Items and Items to Address. Readers should be aware that Item 7.4a is not the 2007 Criteria but the 2006 version. I'm not sure if this is being corrected by the authors but if you are a Baldrige examiner enough said.

Mostly Strengths but a couple of OFIs

The book per se, is an excellent resource for understanding the overall Criteria. Further, as a previous reviewer put it, the linkages between categories is worth the price (almost!). A few additional things I would have liked are : 1] All the blueprints printed consecutively to be able to see the linkages in one place. 2] A more detailed explanation of the Areas to Address. Sometimes it is not easy to understand why certain words / phrases have been used, and it would have been nice if these could have been explained in more detail. 3] A separate document (as a part of the software kit) with all the Survey questions that are currently given with each Criteria item. This would make it possible to either email to respondents or print.

A Strategic Masterpiece

I have been privileged to a member of a Baldrige team at a major service company who won the award, and consulting projects where the criteria was the major template for improvement. This is, by far, the best effort I have seen which strategically presents and describes the criteria, then provides practical counsel on how to apply it. As such, it is invaluable to examiners and consultants, and especially so to senior leaders and internal change agents attempting to improve performance within the Baldrige framework. The authors' lucid explanations of the key linkages within the criteria are alone worth the purchase price. The software included is worth many times the price. If you are serious about using the Baldrige criteria, this is a book you cannot afford to be without.

The Guide Meets Your Need

If the Baldrige Framework represents a 1987 U.S. milestone towards a comprehensive approach to organization excellence, the Baldrige User Guide by John Latham and John Vinyard represents a landmark synthesis of our collective learning and applications to date. The guide faithfully concatenates Categories, Items and Areas To Address of the Baldrige criteria into, of all things, a process description of what it all means for new users, assessors and even advanced users of the performance criteria. The authors accomplish this with comprehensive blueprints that link key elements of the criteria, with brief and effective explanatory comments, real-time examples from Baldrige winners plus assessor question and worksheets. For new and committed users of the Baldrige Framework, the User Guide makes intuitive, practical and valuable "connections that previously were not obvious" (David Sprong, Foreword). Who should invest in this paperback/CD toolkit? Those getting acquainted with the criteria as well as national and state examiners will clutch the user guide as indispensable. I say this as a practitioner (for profit, non-profit) who has benefited from services delivered by a Baldrige winner, has participated in a team that delivered an application for assessment and has experience on a state board of examiners. What catapults the value of the guide is its A-B-C organization around Focus, three Competencies for Performance Excellence and the Journey undertaken by willing organizations. The authors' approach towards an egalitarian Baldrige Framework successfully deconstructs the terminology of the official BNQP criteria, organizes and visually clarifies linkages real and implied using blueprints, breaks through (by at least 20%!) new understandings about exactly HOW and WHAT's Leadership, Execution Excellence or Organizational Learning. You can get the hands-on experience, but the user guide cuts your time investment without cutting corners. After all, the book is the authentic product of "thousands of person years" (though not from the authors). Indeed, the authors dispense contribution credit far and wide to those intimately involved with Baldrige Framework development as well as those committed to achieve extra-ordinary results through their work within winning (and learning) organizations. There is clarity and closure throughout the text, illuminating the authors' substantial knowledge of customers (government, industrial, worldwide) with generous sharing of applied criteria nuance in challenging environments. For example, Thoughts For Leaders vignettes (over 20 are sprinkled throughout) address the value of process documentation, innovation through leadership, sustainable competitive advantage, etc.). The nuggets help organization architects of all stripes arrive at additional insights with respect to systems thinking, core values, organization factors and the maturity of business competencies. Get the CD! Actually, a CD comes with the t