The Baldrige National Quality Program strives to continuously improve all aspects of the Program to deliver greater value to our customers and stakeholders and to improve the effectiveness of our processes. 

To that end, we are offering opportunities for your participation in our annual Improvement Day (I-Day) through two venues. If you’re able to join us on Wednesday, July 30, from 8:00 AM to 3:30 PM in Gaithersburg, MD, we will be holding our “traditional” I-Day meeting, an opportunity for interested people to gather at NIST, provide input, and discuss and refine suggested modifications to the Program.

Additionally, this year, we will be piloting a “virtual I-Day,” two focus groups with up to 15 people in each. The focus groups will be held on Thursday, August 7, from 3:00 PM to 5:00 PM (EDT) and on Thursday, August 14, from 1:00 PM to 3:00 PM (EDT). Our intent is to eventually migrate all of I-Day to a virtual environment—hopefully, in 2009—to enable more and wider participation in our improvement process. Therefore, in 2008, we will begin with a pilot version.

Registration for the on-site and virtual I-Days is available here. We ask that you select only one session, please—July 30, August 7, or August 14— so that we may engage as many of our Baldrige customers and stakeholders as possible.

While comments are welcome at any time, the annual Improvement Day is an opportunity for interested people to provide input and to gather at NIST to discuss and refine suggested modifications.

In preparation for the traditional and virtual I-Day events, you are invited to send us your comments on any aspect of the Program. Typically, comments clustering around a common theme will become subjects for discussion on the Improvement Day agenda. Topics might include but are not limited to:

• Criteria for Performance Excellence - Business/Nonprofit, Education, Health Care
• Revisions to the Award Process
• Revisions to Examiner, New Examiner, and Senior Examiner Training
• Baldrige Award Application Forms Booklet and Eligibility
• Case Studies
• Program Outreach- conferences, exhibits, documents, Web site

Fax:  (301) 948-3716