12 reasons why excellence frameworks fail

By Prashant Hoskote
I often wonder why some organisations embrace excellence frameworks and others struggle to accept them as a way of life. At meetings and conferences, I am asked a variety of questions — are these for everyone? Can it really fit in business, health care, not for profit and even in education sectors? Aren't they complicated? Are there real examples of how and where they truly worked for organisations? Can I really implement something that is so systematic? Don't they cost a lot? These are usually apprehensions of people who want to be talked out of it.

These questions prompted me to put down some tongue-in-cheek thoughts about why excellence frameworks fail and what these frameworks require. If you intend to implement any excellence frameworks, be it Baldrige, EFQM, the Australian model, or any such equivalent, consider yourselves warned.

Reason #1 Delegate too much.

This might sound clichéd but the hard reality is, CEOs often delegate implementation of such things to a 'quality department' and expect them to wave a magic wand to transform the business. This trite approach can ensure failure. There is a reason why 'leadership' is the first category in all excellence frameworks. This has to be driven by the senior leader, not just in speeches, but in continuous action, visibility and support. Mr CEO, don't even think about implementing an excellence framework unless you will unwaveringly lead the charge from the front.

Reason #2 No accountability.

There's too much accountability and responsibility in the organisation. You are paid the same whether you effectively apply these world class excellence frameworks or not. You are already tired when you leave work and you don't need a rigid set of priorities linked to your performance appraisal. All people want is to avoid any extra work and hope for the best.

Reason #3 No organisational alignment.

Excellence frameworks will require daily work to be based on a strategic plan. The organisation's work systems will need to align with the strategic plan. Work will have to be evaluated continuously. Customers will have to be consulted to understand how well you are addressing their needs and expectations. The framework targets work, people, and projects. But getting too many people to be aligned seems like a slow process.

Reason #4 No benchmarking and best practice sharing.

You will want to understand your competitors and how your performance compares with theirs, so you'll start analysing your industry and market. You will discover world class organisations that you may want to benchmark with, and give you insights into aspects of your business you hadn't thought of. Then you will start thinking about how this knowledge can create a sustainable organisation. See how, once you get started, one thing leads to another and soon you are out of your comfort zone.

Reason #5 No action planning.

Using excellence frameworks requires planning. You may be required to develop short and long-term goals that have to be deployed across the organisation. Something could happen and plans might change. You will be thinking about whether your organisation is agile enough to respond to changes. This may force you to develop alternative plans. Then you will want to tell everyone in the organisation about your plans so they can help you execute them. So when will you actually do real work, if you have to plan so much?

Reason #6 Misunderstand and misuse tools.

Excellence frameworks do not replace tools and techniques such as Lean, Six Sigma, Kaizen. On the contrary, these tools are needed to drive breakthrough improvements, reduce costs and improve customer satisfaction. But be careful. Employees involved in these improvements may become more engaged and outspoken about what processes aren't working. It's a slippery slope from employee involvement to empowerment and on to an employee driven organisation.

Reason #7 Don't communicate with staff.

If you use excellence frameworks, senior leadership and management will have to improve communication throughout the organisation. This may mean meetings with frontline employees to better understand business issues and how it can be improved, team huddles, town-hall meetings. Leaders and employees will have to be honest and open about what they can, and more importantly, cannot, do. But many leaders may be uncomfortable mingling with staff. They may prefer to just tell them what to do and see what happens.

Reason #8 Confuse activity with results.

When you receive your assessment feedback report, two things could happen:

1. Your organisation might treat it like an audit report and pick up 'nonconformities' for 'closure', or

2. Organisations typically look to address all opportunities for improvement at one go and ignore the strengths. Am reminded of good old Dr Juran's quote again, "You cannot eat an elephant in one bite, but you can… if you eat it one bite at a time".

Excellence frameworks encourage prioritisation and intelligent use of resources. Money, time, energy and talent can be better focused on what is important. Such alignment can cause an organisation to actually increase capacity and use fewer resources. But reduction of unnecessary hiring could cause turmoil in your human resources department.

Reason #9 Think we are doing as best as we can.

If you use excellence frameworks, you will receive weird looks from other organisations and from insiders who don't understand why the status quo isn't adequate. Your organisation will work toward world class performance and outperform your competition. But then, you actually have to improve your organisation. Frankly, it can be much easier to run an organisation based on experience and gut feel of your managers. After all, that's why you hired them in the first place.

Reason #10 Disregard free consulting advice.

If you use any excellence framework and undergo an assessment or examination of your organisation, you will receive a feedback report that is the most inexpensive consulting assistance designed to improve your organisation. Trained professional examiners or assessors will provide your organisation with ways to improve and maximise resources. But we wouldn't want a detailed feedback report from strangers highlighting where you can focus your efforts, especially when some of them don't even understand your industry.

Reason #11 Train without action.

Organisations often embark on an excellence framework by executing a big bang training plan to make everyone aware of the framework. As Dr Joseph M Juran once said, "Training without action is always forgotten, training with action is always remembered". Start with the senior leaders, let them be the first few set of examiners or assessors. Staff at the grass root level doesn't need to understand what framework you are using. They only need to know, implement and improve the part of the framework that impacts them. Aligned training might result in cost savings and targeted improvements. But it could upset your training department if they enjoy deploying high impact, highly branded, costly training programs.

Reason #12 No strong external and internal relationships.

You have to build strong relationships with suppliers, partners, stakeholders, as well as with your staff. Additionally, these frameworks require an organisation to develop performance metrics on how to measure and evaluate success with those relationships. The danger is, such relationships may break down barriers, improve teamwork and set higher performance requirements, improving efficiency and effectiveness of operational processes. This could disrupt the status quo.

(The author is Senior Director – Quality and Service Excellence, Max India.)