ASQ Leads Baldrige Supporters to Congressional Meetings

April 13, 2005 — Winners and supporters of the Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award gathered in Washington this week, and ASQ made the most of it.

The annual Quest for Excellence Conference hosted by the Baldrige award program brought many Baldrige-winning companies to Washington April 11-13. The conference gives award-winners an opportunity to share their successful quality strategies with eager-to-learn organizations from across the nation.

ASQ's Washington consultants - Bill Sellery and Amy Kimball of Sellery Associates, Inc. - set up Capitol Hill meetings for members of these companies and organizations. The meetings let members of Congress and their staffs hear firsthand about strong support among their constituents for the Baldrige Award, particularly the new nonprofit category, which has been signed into law but not yet funded.

On April 12 ASQ arranged for the CEO of Oklahoma-based Bama Companies (a 2004 Baldrige winner) to meet with Sen. Tom Coburn (R-OK).

That was followed by a meeting with staff of Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-TN) that included the executive vice president of Caterpillar Financial and a representative of the Tennessee Center for Performance Excellence.

Next came a meeting for seven officials of the Boeing Company, a representative of the California Council for Excellence, and an official of the Eastern Municipal Water District with the legislative aide for Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-CA).

Wrapping up the meetings on Tuesday, the legislative director and committee staff of Sen. Judd Gregg (R-NH) heard a compelling quality success story from three officials from Hewlett-Packard America's software manufacturing facility in Nashua, NH. They were accompanied by the executive director and the chair of the Examiner and Applications Committee of the Granite State Quality Council.

April 13 began with morning meetings arranged for representatives of Alatec, Inc., and the Alabama Productivity Center with staff members of Sen. Richard Shelby (R-AL) and Rep. Bud Cramer (D-AL).

Next came a meeting between a representative of 2003 Baldrige winner Medrad, the executive director of Pennsylvania's Keystone Alliance for Performance Improvement, and the legislative aide for Sen. Arlen Specter (R-PA).

On Wednesday afternoon, the chief of staff and a legislative aide for Sen. Wayne Allard (R-CO) welcomed a delegation comprised of the Dean of the Kenneth W. Monfort College of Business at the University of Northern Colorado, a representative of the Colorado Performance Excellence Award, and an official from Operations Management International, the 2000 Baldrige winner in the Service category.

For the past several years, ASQ has been coordinating efforts by Baldrige supporters across the country to establish and fund the nonprofit Baldrige Award category. As part of that effort, ASQ and Sellery Associates bring these supporters together with key legislators.