Award Recipients

HIGH PERFORMING ORGANIZATIONS

The Partnership for Excellence announced the names of high-performing organizations as recipients of the 2024 Awards for Excellence. The awards represent Ohio, Illinois, Indiana & West Virginia's highest honor for performance excellence through innovation, results and visionary leadership using the Baldrige Criteria for Performance Excellence.

2024 Awards for Excellence

Columbus, Ohio, September, 2024 – The Partnership for Excellence (TPE) held its annual membership meeting, awards banquet, and Quest for Success conference.

During the annual meeting, updates from board committees were presented and the election of trustees to the board were conducted. The Quest for Success conference consisted of sharing of best practice sessions led by Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award recipients, TPE award recipients, and performance excellence professionals.

 

Award Recipients - 2024

Organization	Location	Award Level
Meridian Community Unit School District 223	Stillman Valley, Illinois	Gold - Achievement of Excellence
Perry County Board of Developmental Disabilities	New Lexington, Ohio	Silver - Commitment to Excellence
Ironton - Lawrence County Community Action Organization	Ironton, Ohio	Pioneer Award
Fairfax County Public Schools	Fairfax, Virginia	Spirit Award
The Foodbank, Inc.	Dayton, Ohio	Spirit Award
Northwestern Illinois Association	Sycamore, Illinois	Spirit Award

 

Individual Award Recipients - 2024

Individual	President's Award
Denise Kaetzel	Director of Organizational Excellence and Quality at Memorial Hospital and Health Care Center in Jasper, Indiana, received the President’s Award for Extraordinary Volunteerism, which is given to a person who has demonstrated extraordinary service to The Partnership for Excellence.
Kurt Schoch	President, Performance Improvement Consulting, LLC in Carmel, Indiana received the Frank J. Perez Leadership Award, which recognizes a member of the TPE community who exhibits extraordinary individual leadership in performance excellence and leadership behaviors and results consistent with the Baldrige Excellence Framework.

 

Past Award Recipients - 2023

Award Recipients and Press Release - PDF

 

Past Award Recipients - 2022

Award Recipients - PDF

2001 - 2021 Award Recipients - PDF

 

About

The Partnership for Excellence (TPE) is Ohio, Illinois, Indiana and West Virginia's Baldrige-based awards program. TPE assists organizations using the internationally-recognized Baldrige Excellence Framework. TPE's primary product is a comprehensive assessment that helps organizational leaders better understand and prioritize key strengths and opportunities for improvement. While the assessment is the foundation, TPE's main focus is on organizational learning, innovation, resource optimization, continuous improvement, and results.

 

Mission

The mission of TPE is to cultivate organizational performance excellence and continuous improvement in organizations from all industry sectors. By providing a framework for performance excellence through the Baldrige Excellence Framework®, organizations have a greater focus on customers, process management, innovation, work systems, and organization-wide results. These organizations typically see lower costs, improved productivity, and increases in both employee and customer satisfaction leading to growth in market share. TPE’s primary product is a comprehensive assessment that helps organizational leaders better understand and prioritize key strengths and opportunities for improvement.

 

Evaluation Process

All applicants were rigorously evaluated by an independent board of examiners in seven areas defined by the Baldrige Excellence Framework®: leadership; strategy; customers; measurement, analysis, and knowledge management; workforce; operations; and results. The evaluation process for each of the recipients included more than 1,000 hours of review and a site visit by a team of examiners to clarify questions and verify information in the application. Site visits were conducted virtually, via a hybrid approach of in-person and virtual, or in person. An independent panel of judges reviewed each organization’s evaluation, approved the final feedback reports, and developed award recommendations, which were ratified by the TPE Board of Trustees.

 

Category Lead Performer Award

TPE judges may also recognize organizations with a Category Lead Performer Award. These organizations exhibit role model performance in one of the Baldrige Criteria process categories and demonstrate cycles of learning and significant improvement in the category. In 2023, TPE recognizes Lilly Value and Access (LVA) as a lead performer in Category 2 – Strategy. LVA has a systematic strategic planning process that is aligned across all departments. The five-step process incorporates long-term and short-term horizons and has been through several cycles of learning and improvement. LVA's key strategic initiatives and related goals are represented on its scorecard and action plans for implementation are deployed to relevant departmental staff, partners, and collaborators.

 

Award Recipient Recognition Awards | 2023

The Partnership for Excellence’s 2023 award recipients will be honored at an awards banquet on September 11th during TPE's annual Quest for Success conference, which will be held September 11-12, 2023 at The Ohio State University. During the conference, past Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award (MBNQA) recipients will serve as plenary speakers and present information on their performance excellence journeys. TPE's award recipients and past Baldrige recipients will also share best practices in breakout sessions and informal discussions with conference attendees.

 

Closing

For additional information contact: Margot Hoffman, President & CEO, The Partnership for Excellence. Phone (614) 425-7157. The Partnership for Excellence is recognized by the Internal Revenue Service as a 501(c)(3) tax exempt, charitable organization.