Jackie R. Beede
Bruce R. Beede
2010 Baldrige Application Worksheets
Category 1 - Leadership
Note: This intent of this document is for use as a guide for my interviews of an applicant to gather
information to help them develop their application. Often, additional information is gathered based
upon the response to the question itself. This tool is not intended as an assessment guide, nor is it
assured to address all required information.
Category 1 - Leadership
I. Senior Leadership
(Note that senior leaders are considered to be the highest ranking person in the organization and his or her direct
reports)
1. (NOTE: This question, while not requested in the criteria per se, is important to set the stage for any external reader.)
Describe very briefly how your leadership system is designed (who they are, what their reporting structure is (describe
the org chart if you wish), how they make decisions, etc.) …
2. Describe briefly any overall philosophy or approach you use toward leadership…
A. Vision, Values, and Mission
1. How Senior Leaders Set Direction
a. In the Organizational Profile, first page, you showed what your vision, mission, and values are. How are
those set by senior leaders (e.g., through strategic planning, through annual discuss and review with
stakeholders, etc.)?
b. Once the organizational vision, mission and values are set, how do the senior leaders deploy them
(communicate and reinforce them) to the leaders and supervisors of the organization? Then, how do they
communicate them to the workforce? Then, how do they communicate them to suppliers and partners? How
are they communicated to your customers? How about other stakeholders? Look at the table below – if it
makes sense to you please use it…
This table allows you to give separate approaches for communication (like meetings or newsletters, etc.), for
reinforcement (like having topics in a newsletter all year about various aspects, give recognition to those who
exhibit the values, etc.), and for integratimg the use of the MVV into the work systems of the organization (like
having performance reviews tied to them, like ensuring that all budget requests are tied to specific elements).
Deploy to group
Communicate
Reinforce
Integrate into work system
Leaders and
1.
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1.
Supervisors
2.
2.
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3.
Workforce
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Suppliers/Partners 1.
1.
1.
2.
2.
2.
3.
3.
3.
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Customer
Other stakeholders
Bruce R. Beede
1.
2.
3.
1.
2.
3.
1.
2.
3.
1.
2.
3.
1.
2.
3.
1.
2.
3.
1.
2.
3.
1.
2.
3.
1.
2.
3.
c. This one is a bit difficult to put into words … the question is – how do the actions of the senior leaders reflect
their commitment to the values of the organization? We are looking for some specific activities here, not a
broad statement that says “Yes – we have zero tolerance of ethics violations”. What things do they do to
exhibit their commitment to the values. At a minimum, take each value (identified on the first page of the
Organizational Profile) and give examples of how senior leaders show their commitment to the value. At more
mature levels we see things like senior leaders meeting with groups of employees and talking about one of the
values and what it means to them.
2. Promote Legal & Ethical Environment
(Note: you will describe what your approaches are to ensure that the organization behaves legally and ethically
in another section. Here you are answering questions about senior leadership and their role in creating a legal
and ethical environment.)
a. What things do senior leaders personally do that fosters an environment of legal and ethical behavior?
Think about things that foster a legal and ethical environment, like public discussions of what is legal and
ethical and how they personally deal with issues, or perhaps they assure the anonymity of people who report
issues, or even some form of recognition for people who exhibit this value.
b. What things do senior leaders personally do that requires an environment of legal and ethical behavior?
There may be some overlap with the previous question, but think about things that they do that communicate
their requirements of legal and ethical behavior like messages emphasizing policies, or their participation in
leading training about legal and ethical behavior. The crux is, how do you ensure that workforce and
stakeholders understand what legal and ethical requirements are and how they can comply. Another good
response is to say that it is an organizational value (if it is), and that senior leaders deploy those values.
c. What things do senior leaders personally do that results in an environment of legal and ethical behavior?
Again, there may be some overlap with the previous questions, but think about things that they do that are more
direct like demonstrating a no-tolerance attitude toward infractions, or perhaps they lead legal and ethical
investigations when needed, or personally talking to customers and suppliers to identify any issues. Senior
leaders should also be looking at measures on a regular basis that help to identify legal and ethical behavior
like survey results, people terminated for cause, suppliers who violate legal and ethical requirements, hotline
calls, etc.
3. Create a Sustainable Organization
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(Note: many of these questions will have descriptions of your approaches in another section like the
performance improvement approach or the workforce learning approach. Here you are answering questions
about senior leadership and their role in creating an environment that is sustainable with those things.)
a. What things do your senior leaders do to specifically promote organizational performance improvement?
Do they charter teams when there is a performance issue found? Do they recognize people or teams who do
performance improvement? Do they participate in the training for performance improvement? What other
things do they do to create an environment that encourages and expects employees to do performance
improvement?
b. What things do your senior leaders do to specifically promote the accomplishment of your mission and
strategic objectives? Do they ensure that every employee has performance goals linked to the strategic
direction of the organization? Do they recognize people or teams who have done things to contribute to the
accomplishment of the mission and objectives? What other things do they do to create an environment where
everyone is focused on the mission and strategic direction of the organization?
c. What things do your senior leaders do to specifically promote innovation in the organization? Do they
provide budget specifically for innovation? Do they champion teams to address innovative ideas? Do they
role-model innovation by thinking out-of-the-box? Do they recognize employees or teams who come up with
something innovative? What other things do they do to create an environment where risk taking is accepted
and new ideas are honored and acted upon?
d. What things do your senior leaders do to specifically promote a culture of competitiveness – or a culture
where you want to be the best, be a role model, and be a leader in what you do? Do they review your
performance compared to best-in-class? Do they encourage and participate in benchmarking with other
organizations that are known to be best-in-class? Do they recognize people or teams who have role-model
levels of performance?
e. What things do your senior leaders do to specifically promote a culture of agility – the ability to change
course quickly when the need arises? Do they regularly review the status of projects to see if they are moving
at an acceptable (quick) pace? Do they regularly review external information that tells them if they are on
target so that changes could be made if the external environment changes? Do they recognize people or teams
who identify threats and quickly adapt or change course to address them?
f. What things do your senior leaders do to specifically promote a culture of learning for individuals? Do they
talk about the importance of ongoing learning? Do they provide opportunities for personal learning? Do they
look for training and learning solutions to issues? Do they recognize people who have exhibited the desire for,
and accomplished, ongoing learning and development? What other things do they do to create an environment
where ongoing learning is expected?
g. What things do your senior leaders do to specifically promote a culture of organizational learning – that is,
learning by the organization at-large? Do they ensure that lessons learned from projects are documented and
shared across the organization? Do they actively seek out sources for organizational learning from places like
employee ideas, research findings, student/customer and stakeholder input, best-practice sharing, and
This tool and all information contained within this document is the sole property of Accelerated Improvement Mentoring,
Incorporated (AIM, Inc.) and may not be shared or used without the express written consent of Jackie Beede or Bruce Beede.
AIM, Inc.
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2664 Highway 18 W, Fayette, AL 35555
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Jackie R. Beede
Bruce R. Beede
benchmarking? Do they actively participate in these activities (like reviewing research, soliciting and acting
on employee or stakeholder ideas and input, identifying best-practices or going on benchmarking visits)?
h. What things do your senior leaders do to specifically improve their personal leadership skills? Do they seek
input on the performance from a variety of sources in order to find opportunities for improvement (e.g.,
employee survey, performance measure results, community input, supervisor input? Do they develop
improvement plans based on performance evaluation findings? Do they engage in training and development
activities on a regular basis?
i. What things do your senior leaders do to specifically develop future organizational leaders? Do they mentor
employees to develop skills? Do they give employees opportunities to grow and develop leaderships skills? Do
they talk about the requirements of leaders? Do the participate in succession planning?
B. Communication and Organizational Performance
1. Communicate with and Engage Workforce
a. What methods do senior leaders use to communicate with the entire workforce (all employees in all
capacities at all locations)? Are there specific communication approaches used with certain segments of the
workforce that are not used, or are used differently, with others? Which of these approaches are frank, twoway discussions? Which of these approaches are used to communicate key decisions? Try to use the table
below to organize your thoughts:
Communication method
What employee
What is communicated?
Frequency Two(e.g., Key decisions, Strategic
groups
Way?
direction, organization
performance, recognition,
gaining input, etc.)
b. What role do senior leaders take in reward and recognition programs that are focused on performance and
focus on your customers/students/patients? Do they actually present the award? Do they send a
congratulatory letter? Do they notify the individual that they have been selected to receive an award? What
other roles do they take in recognition programs to ensure that it is relevant and honored for employees?
Which of the recognition programs that you have are focused on high performance and
customer/student/patient focus?
2. Create a Focus on Action
a. What things do senior leaders do to specifically create a focus on action in the organization, particularly
where related to accomplishing the directions of the organization? This could be their participation in the
budget process to ensure that improvement actions have sufficient resources; participation on improvement
teams where they demonstrate how to keep projects moving; taking on actions from strategic planning and
driving them through to completion, tracking, and success; tracking measures related to the strategic plan and
ensuring that they continue to move in a positive direction by working with teams to continue driving results.
b. What things do senior leaders do to specifically create a focus on performance improvement? Do they
sponsor and keep track of teams, helping when needed? Do they recognize the accomplishments of people and
This tool and all information contained within this document is the sole property of Accelerated Improvement Mentoring,
Incorporated (AIM, Inc.) and may not be shared or used without the express written consent of Jackie Beede or Bruce Beede.
AIM, Inc.
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teams who are on performance improvement teams and have successful outcomes? Do they ensure that all
improvement activities use a specific improvement approach (turning it back if a team is not using the format
and approach)? Do they require data in all key decisions?
c. What key measures do senior leaders regularly (monthly, quarterly, annually) review to keep track of
organizational progress (both strategic and day-to-day operational)? What do they do if those measures are
not meeting target? Do they require an improvement team, or require an action plan be developed?
d. How do senior leaders ensure that the organization sets performance expectations that address the needs of
all key stakeholder groups? Is there a specific tool that they use in strategic planning that causes them to
consider the needs of each key stakeholder? What criteria do they use for making decisions when stakeholders
requirements are in conflict with each other?
II. Governance and Societal Responsibilities
A. Organizational Governance
1. Review and Achieve Governance
a. What methods do you have in place to ensure that there is accountability for the actions of management?
This could be audits, regular review of their key measures, or establishing some corrective action approach
when an organizational unit is not performing to plan.
b. What methods do you have in place to ensure that there is fiscal accountability within the organization?
This could be audits, review of the books by the public (open book), assignment of review responsibility to
someone other than the manager to ensure independence of evaluation, or some policy like having every cost
center manager take a required week vacation during which time someone works in their position.
c. What methods do you have in place to ensure transparency in operations? This might be openly posting
measures for external review (open book), posting the results of operational review metrics for others to see,
rotating management periodically to provide fresh eyes, or having regular reviews of performance that are
open to attend.
d. What methods do you have in place to establish fair and ethical standards for selection and disclosure
policies for governance board members (if this applies to you)? Do you ensure that you only have a certain
number of inside vs. outside board members? Do you ensure that there is not a conflict of interest with a board
member? Do they have to complete a disclosure of all financial and business interests each year?
e. What methods do you have in place to ensure that both internal and external audits are fair and independent
from the group being audited? Do you have a separate audit group that reports directly to the highest ranking
official? Do you hire external agencies to do audits that do not have a conflict of interest with you, and ensure
that they report their findings to the governance board?
f. What methods do you have in place to ensure the protection of stakeholder (and stockholder if appropriate)
interests? This could be something like ensuring that you have a policy around acceptance of gifts from
This tool and all information contained within this document is the sole property of Accelerated Improvement Mentoring,
Incorporated (AIM, Inc.) and may not be shared or used without the express written consent of Jackie Beede or Bruce Beede.
AIM, Inc.
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Bruce R. Beede
customers and suppliers in order to avoid unfair practices, ensuring that there is an independent, nonthreatening approach for customers and employees to complain or to report a grievance, etc.
2. Evaluate Senior Leaders Performance
a. What approach is used to evaluate the performance of senior leaders? How is the chief executive evaluated
for performance (e.g., according to whether they met their goals, with a 360-degree review, based on
customer/student/patient and employee survey feedback, etc.)? How are the other senior leaders of the
organization evaluated for performance (e.g., review by supervisor, self-evaluation, any of the previously
mentioned approaches, etc.)? If you have one, how is the performance of your board evaluated (e.g., selfevaluation, survey of stakeholders, whether the organization met its targets, etc.)?
b. How do you evaluate the performance of the overall leadership system? That is, how do you measure or
assess how well your leadership structure is performing? This could be by determining how well they met
targets or accomplished plans, a self-evaluation of the leadership team’s effectiveness in working together to
accomplish the organization’s mission, vision, and directions.
c. Once the senior leaders evaluation is conducted, how do they use the information to help them develop and
improve their own personal leadership effectiveness? Do they create a development plan? Do they take
training and receive mentoring?
d. Once the evaluation of the overall leadership system is conducted, how do leaders use the information to
improve the effectiveness of the leadership system as a whole? This might be looking at restructuring, changing
roles and responsibilities, engaging in new or modified leadership approaches, etc.
B. Legal and Ethical Behavior
1. Adverse Impacts of Products and Operations
a. This first part of the question is pretty hard to get your head around – it asks if your organization has any
processes in place to specifically mitigate the impact that you might have on society. Considering your
programs and offerings, this might include ensuring timely and equitable access or even cost. Considering
operations, this might be cost of operations, perception of efficiency, any environmental waste that you might
have coming from labs or parking, and even the perceptions of the public about how you use your resources,
etc.
b. What approaches do you use to listen and learn externally in order to find out what kinds of issues might be
coming up that you will need to address? This includes potential regulatory issues and potential community
perception issues. (These might be approaches such as attending legislative meetings, attending trade shows,
membership in your trade organization, attending Chambers of Commerce, having community focus
discussions, etc.)
c. Once you find out about potential social concerns (either through the methods described above or some
other way), do you have a systematic approach in place to prepare for these issues proactively? This includes
any approaches that you use to address environmental issues (recycling, using alternative chemicals, etc.).
This also includes any approaches you use to manage your suppliers to accomplish addressing societal issues
This tool and all information contained within this document is the sole property of Accelerated Improvement Mentoring,
Incorporated (AIM, Inc.) and may not be shared or used without the express written consent of Jackie Beede or Bruce Beede.
AIM, Inc.
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2664 Highway 18 W, Fayette, AL 35555
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Bruce R. Beede
(like using different suppliers to enable use of alternative resources, or getting suppliers to work with you to
solve specific societal issues).
d. In the Profile, in P.1a(5), you outline your key regulatory requirements like mandated federal, state and
local standards, curricula, programs and assessments; applicable occupational health and safety regulations;
accreditation requirements, administrator and teacher certification requirements, and environmental and
financial regulations; boundaries and service offering restrictions. For those requirements, do you have
processes in place to help you remain in compliance for each area (e.g., hazardous waste disposal methods,
safety processes for specific equipment usage, curricula design process that checks to ensure the curricula is
allowed for your area, etc.)? What are the measures you use to ensure you are in compliance for each and
what are your goals for each? If you filled in the table in the Profile, then you have already answered this
question – just say that.
e. (Note: This question is the same as the one above, but instead of regulated issues this concerns the risks that
you have identified internally.) For risks that you identify for your programs and offerings, services and
operations (like the potential to not address all requirements for a certain certification, like the potential to not
have jobs in the community for your graduates, etc.), what processes do you have in place to address these
risks? What measures do you use to ensure you are addressing these risks, and what are your goals for those
measures?
2. Assure Ethical Behavior
a. What processes/approaches do you have in place to assure that your employees behave in an ethical manner
in everything they do? (Start with anything you do to promote a culture of ethics like have it as part of your
values and then you deploy those values continuously. Other things might include any training you have in
ethics, any survey’s that you have that “tests” knowledge of what is ethical, ask customers/students/patients
how well your employees demonstrate ethics, have a hotline that allows people to report unethical behavior,
etc.)
b. What measures do you have in place to monitor ethical behavior? Measures should be taken to track ethics
related to all stakeholders, like ethics in your interactions with employees, students, the community, suppliers,
partners, other schools, etc. (perhaps grievances, lawsuits or complaints related to ethics).
c. What do you do when there is a breach in ethical behavior? Do you have a process or policy related to how
you investigate and discipline or release people who have breached ethical behavior policies? What measures
do you have of this (like number of people released for-cause, number of lawsuits, etc.)
C. Societal Responsibilities and Support of Key Communities
1. Societal Well-Being and Benefit
(Note: The questions in this section are directed toward contributing to society while doing your day-to-day
work to provide products and services. Perhaps you receive money for these or do them as a part of normal
business, but it is not charitable work.)
a. Do you have programs or practices in place that are for the purpose of contributing to society in some way,
that are in addition to providing general products and/or services? (this might include providing clinics to the
community on weekends if you are a healthcare provider, providing weekend classes about some socially
This tool and all information contained within this document is the sole property of Accelerated Improvement Mentoring,
Incorporated (AIM, Inc.) and may not be shared or used without the express written consent of Jackie Beede or Bruce Beede.
AIM, Inc.
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2664 Highway 18 W, Fayette, AL 35555
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Jackie R. Beede
Bruce R. Beede
important issue if you are an education organization, providing discounts on products to build a house for the
homeless or to fix-up a building where social services are provided, etc.)
b. If you do environmental scanning to inform your strategic planning process (described in Category 2), do
you include research about things of societal relevance like environmental issues, social issues facing your
community (like under-education, under-employment, etc.), and about the economic issues facing your
community (like recession, poverty level, etc.)?
c. What kinds of activities do you include in your daily operations that addresses issues like those described in
the previous question? (e.g., design programs to retrain people who have been laid off, create programs to
train people in areas of future growth in your community, ensure that your operations are environmentally
friendly or carbon-neutral, etc.)
2. Active Support in Key Communities
(Note: The questions in this section are directed toward more “above the call” types of activities to benefit
society in some way, either through pure charity activities or by using your core competencies to do charitable
work.)
a. First of all, what are the communities that you support through your contribution activities? This could be
general population when you contribute to something like the United Way; it could be the underprivileged of
your own community through habitat for humanity or soup kitchens; it could be very specific like battered
women. Choose specific communities though. Often this could be small businesses in your geographic area, it
could be businesses in your area (through the Chambers of Commerce), or even your general industry (through
leadership in industry associations). Perhaps it is even communities in which your employees live (served
through an employee committee that decides how they want to serve their community).
b. For those communities identified above, how did you decide these would be the communities to serve? You
should have had some discussion in some format (strategic planning, leadership meetings, employee meetings,
etc.) that lead to the decision to purposefully support those groups.
c. Now, for those communities, what is the service that you provide (contribution, hours, in-kind donations,
etc). What role do senior leaders play in support of these communities – be specific (i.e., x number of leaders
serve in leadership positions in Chambers or industry groups, x number of leaders spend x number of hours in
community service with certain groups)? Give the same type of information about your employees –w hat role
do they plan in support of these communities?
This tool and all information contained within this document is the sole property of Accelerated Improvement Mentoring,
Incorporated (AIM, Inc.) and may not be shared or used without the express written consent of Jackie Beede or Bruce Beede.
AIM, Inc.
20612928515
2664 Highway 18 W, Fayette, AL 35555
Page 8 of 8
(205) 768-0023