Abstract

No single quality system, criterion, or philosophy will provide the solution to an organization's quality problems. A sound quality program can be implemented by an organization using ISO 9001:2000, the Baldrige Award and its criteria, and total quality management only if it actually makes the effort to use these elements and their associated tools to create, maintain, and continuously improve real quality. Each quality paradigm represents a rational, competitive, and profitable way to run a business. Organizations should only invest in the paradigms if they will actually use them to achieve quality and improve business performance. TQM and the Baldrige Award are similar. Both depend on the ideas of W. Edwards Deming. ISO 9001:2000's set of quality management systems and the Baldrige criteria have attempted to create a grand unification by which all quality requirements and functional demands of all given organizations would be subsumed. Both Baldrige and ISO 9000:2000 are oriented to customer, process, and continuous improvement. ISO 9001:2000, Baldrige criteria, and TQM quality paradigms use, support, encourage, and may involve many of the same tools and methodologies. The differences between ISO 9001:2000 and Baldrige appear to involve points of view, with ISO 90001:2000 being detail, document, and technically oriented, while Baldrige criteria tend to center on results, employees, marketing, financial analysis, strategic planning, and top management. The ISO 9000 quality standard is administered by private registration organizations accredited by national bodies, but the Baldrige Award is not internationally recognized as a quality paradigm in the same way. Compatibilities between the two systems would allow them to be merged into a single quality paradigm where the strengths of each paradigm's criteria would offset the other's weaknesses. The proposed paradigm merger could be termed MB-9000.