The Purpose and Effectiveness of Various Measures of Excellence - Assignment Example

Work Sheet – CO4. Compare the purpose and effectiveness of various measures of excellence Why is excellence important to an organization? It helps toimprove performance by focusing on the customer, stakeholders and process management and also enhance organization’s competitiveness and sustainability. It also enables the organization to deal with business challenges. How could an organization measure excellence? The organization can use business excellence models such the European Foundation for Quality Management (EFQM) and Baldrige Criteria for Performance Excellence. These set the criteria for gauging performance in organizations and help to identify organization strengths and areas for improvement. It could also use excellence tools such as the balanced scorecard. Give examples of various measurements of excellence for an organization? High financial returns Improved operations or efficiency. Quality leadership Customer satisfaction Quality of process, products and services. Give three examples of international excellence awards? The European Foundation for Quality Management (EFQM) The Baldrige Criteria for Performance Excellence Sheikh Khalifa Excellence Award Dubai Quality Awards Global Business Excellence Awards Give three examples of the different measurements those excellence awards have. People development and involvement Financial results Customer results. List the website of the three international excellence awards www.efqm.org www.nist.gov/baldrige/publications/criteria.cfm www.skea.ae www.businessexcellence.gov.ae www.gbeawards.com Which international excellence awards do you think are the most relevant to organizations within the UAE? Sheikh Khalifa Excellence Award Dubai Quality Awards What are UAE quality awards? They are awards that ensure excellence in business and a means of improving standards of business in UAE. Does Abu Dhabi have a quality award? What is it? What are the measurements of this award? Yes. Sheikh Khalifa Excellence Award (SKEA). Results orientation, customer focus, leadership and constancy of purpose, management by process and facts, people development and involvement, partnership development, public responsibility, continuous learning, innovation and improvement. List the website for the Abu Dhabi quality award www.skea.ae Give two examples of who has won this award how did it benefit the organizations? National Bank of Abu Dhabi-Diamond-2013 Emirates Technical Association-Gold-2013. The winners benefit by acquiring branding privileges and display of special logos on stationery and marketing collaterals for a maximum period of three years. Does Dubai have a quality award? What is it? What are the measurements of this award? Yes. Dubai Quality Award. The criteria includes leadership; strategy; people; process, products and services; partner and resources; customer results; people results; society results, and key performance results. List the website for the Dubai quality award. Businessexcellence.gov.ae/en/pages/default.aspx Give two examples of who has won this award how did it benefit the organizations? Emirates Gas L.L.C-2012 Union National Bank-2012 The organizations benefit by representing role model organizations in the sectors they operate in. The organizations are supposed to ensure sustained improvement activities and this benefit the organization as a whole in terms of competitiveness and improved performance. They also use award logos on stationery, publicity campaigns, and marketing materials for three years. Does the government of the UAE support excellence awards? How? Why? The government of UAE supports excellence awards by ensuring government agencies participate in the Abu Dhabi for Excellence in Government Performance awards. This is to ensure excellence in government performance and positioning Abu Dhabi government among the top five governments in the world (www.abudhabi.ae). It also helps deliver improved value to government customers and stakeholders as well as communicating and sharing best practice nationally and internationally. What is the terminology of excellence awards? Business excellence models What are excellence tools? They are tools used to assess an organization to determine whether it is improving and areas that need improvement hence sustainable growth, high quality and improved performance. Such tools include: balanced scorecard, Lean Six Sigma, and process management. How would excellence tools improve quality? Excellence tools ensure the strategic objective of the organization is being achieved by aligning its activities with it. By focusing on customers, internal business processes, products and services, the tools ensure continuous improvement hence high quality standards. What is the difference between a quality and an excellence system? A quality system ensures the company is operating at high standards thus producing quality products and services but an excellence system is broader in that it uses quality management principles and tools to improve performance in broader areas of customer focus, stakeholder value and process management (BUS 4583 p.3). What are the key elements addressed in quality and excellence systems? Key elements addressed include: process management, leadership, strategy, customer results, process, product and services and key performance results. What is self-assessment? It involves an organization assessing itself to identify improvement opportunities, areas of strength areas for development. What are the principles of self-assessment? It is to promote continuous improvement by identifying gaps to be closed and areas that need development. Why is self-assessment important in the addressing excellence systems? It is important to carry out self-assessment so as to deal with challenges that the business may encounter, ensure improved performance and competitiveness as well as sustainability. This is essential in ensuring the criteria for business excellence is being met hence long-term competitiveness. What is done with the information found in a self-assessment of the excellence system? The information can be used in benchmarking to identify gaps that exist and also best practice to fill those gaps. What is gap analysis? How does that relate to self-assessment? Gap analysis involves assessing where the business is currently and where it intends to be in future. This enables the organization to develop a suitable strategy to achieve its desired state. This relates to self-assessment in that it helps to identify areas of strength and build on them and areas of weakness to improve them hence attain excellence. This gap arises after a self-assessment is carried out. How would an organization implement an excellence system? Implementation should be a gradual planned and purposeful process. What are the steps involved in implementing an excellence system The first step is for leaders to be role models by developing a culture of excellence. It then engages in the improvement cycle by applying and Standardizing what works and disregarding what does not work. What is best practice? It is a technique that through experience and research has been proven to lead to desired result in terms of effectiveness, relevance, sustainability, and efficiency among other criteria. Why would organizations share best practice? Organizations share best practices to improve on their operations hence improved quality, productivity and efficiency. An organization does not have to waste its time and resources in engaging in methods that do not work or will not lead to desired results thus they use the best practices in the industry. What are the benefits of incorporating best practice? It helps save on time and resources by non-duplication and using proven methods. It helps to enhance quality of products and services and operations. Increased productivity and efficiency. Read More