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Excellence and The Leadership Imperative: Rick - Edgeman@mail - Biz.colostate - Edu
Excellence and The Leadership Imperative: Rick - Edgeman@mail - Biz.colostate - Edu
Leadership for Business Excellence. Business Excellence is, on the whole, an emerging
Understanding of leadership in this context is also emerging and has to date focused more
In this issue, the topic of Leadership for Business Excellence is approached from
gender differences, the importance of values and ethics, the balance of core values and
core competencies, identification and deployment of values at the corporate level, and
application in the public sector. Contributing authors to this issue bring not only differing
business and academic backgrounds, but also differing cultural experiences since
contributing authors include citizens of Denmark, Ireland and the United States.
the globe refers to it by one or the other of these two terms. But whatever Business or
by leadership, hence the topic of this special issue of the Journal of Management Systems
The concept of Business Excellence is recognized around the world and is at the
models applied by numerous business entities, whether they be public or private (Conti,
1997). Business Excellence can be regarded as the overall way of working that balances
(Edgeman and Scherer, 1999). But what is this “overall way of working” and how can we
make it as portable as possible, so that its benefits can be more broadly distributed? More
specifically, what contribution does leadership have to make to this “overall way of
working?”
These are important considerations since, indeed, highly efficient and effective
economies through enhanced competitive position. Of course, not all environments are
competitive per se (Cox, 1999) and this is perhaps more well-known elsewhere around
the globe than it is in the United States, that is, in regions where the public sector forms a
recognizable.
Excellence, its heart and soul is leadership, which is herein regarded as systemic to the
extent that an organization’s ability to anticipate and counter threats on the local level
Business Excellence consideration because it deals with the foremost of the stakeholder
1999).
way of working.” Further, which of these can be deployed throughout the organization
While effective leadership styles may vary dramatically across markets and
these core values are principles practiced by Leonardo da Vinci, regarded by some as
approached via the reward and recognition system and through organizational
“success in our endeavor”, that is, assessment of leadership for business excellence.
organization’s human resource. Most Business Excellence models limit the role of
leading to CEOs and senior executives and regard it as competence based. The legacy of
leaders across human history however, is written in terms of core values such as courage,
wisdom, sacrifice, stewardship (Block, 1993), servanthood (Greenleaf, 1997) and so on.
In an act of corporate nihilism, Business Excellence models typically ignore such values
Leadership criteria from various international quality award models indicate four
primary areas that are assessed (Edgeman and Conlan, 1998) – none of which map to the
sort of core value based legacies often associated with leadership. These commonly
competencies, the European Foundation for Quality Management recently modified the
self-assessment model that underlies the European Quality Award (EFQM, 1998). The
so-called “improved model” is being applied for the first time in 2000 and adopts the
assessment. Enablers of Business Excellence, such as leadership, are examined for the
approach followed and its rationale, how the approach supports policy and strategy and
how it is focused on the needs of the stakeholders affected by it. Further, the extent of
it is full and effective are investigated. Assessment and review activities that take place
places additional focus on the leaders’ personal role in ensuring that the organizations
The improved EFQM model defines leadership as: How the behaviors and
actions of the executive team create the culture, values and overall direction required for
long term success. These behaviors and actions are appropriately reinforced and
deployed by all other leaders within the organization (EFQM, 1998). As an enabler of
Business Excellence, a key issue is how the approach to leadership is developed, with
objectives;
strategy;
• defining the processes that generate the key leadership related activities;
environment;
organization, that is, made systemic -- is examined within the improved EFQM model
behaviors and actions. Among issues addressed are the selection, cultivation and
that the EFQM perspective on Leadership for Business Excellence recognizes the time-
values; setting and communication of direction and priorities; forging unity of purpose;
responding to stakeholders; driving ethical behavior into the organization; and updating
system with early warning indicators and measures; identification and evaluation of
effective and ineffective leadership; use of upward evaluation, appraisal and assessment;
evaluation of the role of leaders in driving the innovation and learning process;
prioritizing and implementing the learning from all monitoring, assessment and review
activities to improve efficiency and effectiveness; and validation of the assessment and
review process.
In January 1998 more than two dozen of the world’s most influential executives
gathered at CBS studios in New York and the BBC studios in London. Consensus on
three strategic and competitive business growth drivers emerged from this gathering,
billed as the first Best Practices for Global Competitiveness Summit (EFQM, 1998).
• innovation through formal and informal processes for discovering and applying new
business ideas from both traditional and nontraditional sources (Bogan and English,
business efforts that have both high risk and great benefit for all participating parties
being.
Vital strands in the tapestry of Business Excellence that are consistent with ideas
• value for the individual and knowledge issues, such as training, fast learning,
multidisciplinary teams;
• a balanced stakeholder perspective that recognizes the link between employee and
shareholder value;
formation and management of strategic alliances (Labovitz and Rosansky, 1997); and
Whether directly or implied, various core values -- where “values” is meant in the
traditional ethical and moral sense -- map to these drivers of Business Excellence and
supporting ideas. These include fairness, honesty, respect for the individual and integrity
resources including its human resource (Block, 1993); servanthood to the organization’s
(Critelli, 1998; Price Waterhouse Change Integration Team, 1995); and a value for
reproduction, that is, commitment to the principle that leaders beget more leaders.
America and South America. The strategic intentions MAAOE are strongly related to
pursuit of MAAOEs’ strategic intentions -- since, indeed, Deming's ideas and methods
are regarded as central to quality management -- the womb from whence the babe of
Business Excellence sprang, it is possible that another line of pursuit might also be
Da Vinci was no mere dreamer who schemed but did not act. This is well-
documented by his seminal work in human anatomy and the wealth of art and scientific
work that he bequeathed to civilization, including designs for creations that would be
technologically impossible for hundreds of years after his death, such as the submarine
Leadership for Business Excellence. In the Italian, these seven principles are: Curiosità,
continuous learning.
• Sensazione: the continual refinement of the senses, especially sight, as the means to
enliven experience.
• Arte / Scienza: development of the balance between science and art, logic and
include curiosity among their core values. It is not too strong a statement to say the
curiosity is at the core of being a learning organization (Senge, 1990). A detailed reading
of the Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award Criteria for Performance Excellence
(1999) indicates that curiosità is highly consistent with Business Excellence and that an
While innovation and new product development may be driven by curiosità and
may lead to marketplace success, it is dimostrazione that transforms curiosità’s ideas into
requires striking a balance between the patience needed to deliver a market-ready product
Organizational leadership must approach the dimostrazione process with meekness -- the
idea of which is similar to the “meeking” of a horse, that is, bringing the power of the
dimostrazione process under control, without breaking the curiosità spirit by which it is
driven.
stakeholder perspective, it is certainly the case that the pre-eminent among stakeholders
various means of “listening to the voice of the customer.” These means may include
levels, use of focus groups or application of the more formal technique of quality
function deployment. Regardless of the method or methods applied, the analogy between
“listening” and sensazione is an obvious one. It is worth noting that many means of
learning have been identified and that these commonly involve active use of our senses
with listening being among these. Listening can be regarded as both a competency and a
core value and it both the practice and promotion of listening is key to Leadership for
sfumato in that the nature of our existence is to find that which is predictable while at the
same time living within the larger framework wherein there is precious little that is
absolutely certain. The challenge of course is to embrace, rather than abhor, ambiguity.
From a leadership perspective, this can often be modeled through the policy deployment
process wherein leadership at the top of the organization -- from whom “big vision” is
often an expectation -- will state a vital few goals, called hoshins. It is generally held that
cascades down through the organization with individuals at each successive level
deriving their own hoshins that will in some way actualize those from the preceding
level. Important is that the individual is responsible for determination of the means by
which their hoshins are actualized, rather than having these means imposed. Clearly, it is
not that our desire is for anything to “go up in smoke” -- but we should note that the fire
that burns down the house and the fire that warms it both produce smoke. In this case, our
manifestation of sfumato is intended to warm the home and bring liberation, rather than
bondage -- but this will require welcoming, rather than fearing, ambiguity.
education and training in many areas, including use of quality improvement and
creativity methods -- methods that are in some cases “left-brain” and in other cases
holistic one. This is the goal of arte / scienza: the integration of “left-brain” thinking and
for education and training is generally assessed in the Human Resource Management and
responsibility of leadership.
It is interesting to note that the Latin root for corporalita is corpus and that, in
essence, these words are used for corporation or organization or body. The primary idea
in the da Vincian context is one of completeness -- both personal and corporate -- through
teamwork. The criteria of most Business Excellence models generally expect leadership
to support these emphases, both motivationally and from the perspective of resource
dedication.
knowledge of the truth that maximum benefit to the whole is often derived from the
sacrificial action of one or more of its constituent elements. This is systems thinking in
the sense that Deming (1986) emphasized wherein optimization of the organization is not
and Reid, 1999). The Biblically familiar among readers of this article will recognize this
as analogous to the admonition of the Apostle Paul in his first letter to Christians who
Deployment Principles
Based on this idea, the premise is that core value deployment can be facilitated via the
following means:
Other methods not so keenly tied to measurement that have proved effective in deploying
four approaches can be found in Paine (1994) as can examples of organizational failure
integrating core values and competencies. On this premise, the reward and recognition
system provides a vehicle for deployment of both values and competencies -- indeed, this
system is especially promising since it is here that means and measures for deploying and
reinforcing values and competencies can be devised. The reward and recognition system
performance measures are a strong force in shaping organizational culture and those
measures used should directly reflect core values identified for deployment.
arbitration and decision-making and thus its topos is at the pinnacle of the organizational
members of the organization, down to the interface with the customer -- whomever is in
and, in some sense, loyalty in real-time. It is in this regard that empowerment is critical to
corporate objectives and constraints. That person is, in essence, a leader. In this regard,
leadership is not constrained to individuals and has no singular place in the organization,
How then do we measure the extent to which leadership has been driven into an
organization, the degree to which issues are being effectively dealt with at local levels?
At the organizational level the issue is in part one of determining the capacity to ‘forgive
and forget’ in those instances where an individual has made an honest mistake, for
advanced leadership systems do not personalize and, thus, do not persecute failures.
There are observable characteristics, measures for which may be derived, for assessing
systems more nearly conform to systemic leadership and thus promote Business
Excellence more effectively than do traditional leadership systems. Edgeman and Scherer
(1999) suggest a variety of characteristics, measures for which must be derived, that can
herein considered.
Tito Conti, the man responsible for developing much of that constituting the
critieria of the EFQM Business Excellence Model provides excellent guidance on the
While not discussed explicitly herein, another means of assessing overall organizational
performance is the balanced scorecard (Kaplan and Norton, 1996). Assessment is critical
goal of Business Excellence. While many assessment tools and techniques exist, the
balanced scorecard and the criteria of various international quality prizes, such as the
European Quality Award or America's Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award are
Conclusion
conceived indicates that competencies that augment principle-centered core values are
the neglect of core values. In an effort to restore balance this work has suggested both
Among these sources were the leadership criteria of the EFQM Business Excellence
Model that is used to assess applicants for the European Quality Award, ideas generated
Leonardo da Vinci.
is not sufficient. These must be deployed and, once deployed, their effectiveness
through the reward and recognition system and through organizational performance
spirit of continuous improvement a legitimate start must be made and imperfect measures
can be honed over time. Critical to the honing process is assessment. Assessment within
the context of the aforementioned EFQM Business Excellence Model was discussed as
were ideas intended to capture the degree of progress made toward systemic leadership,
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Biographical Sketch
of Business at Colorado State University where he also serves as director of the SABER
Institute for Self-Assessment & Business Excellence Research. Rick earned the doctoral
degree in Statistics in 1983 from the University of Wyoming and has previously served as
a visiting professor in the Quality & Innovation Research Group at the Aarhus School of
Texas, the Center for Quality & Applied Statistics and Graduate Statistics Department at
more than 100 articles, many of which appear in such journals as Quality Progress, Total
Quality Management, The TQM Magazine, International Journal of Quality & Reliability
MAAOE was founded in 1998 and has participation spanning more than 20 nations.