By Saad Ghafoor and Dr. Robin Mann, Centre for Organisational Excellence Research, September 2020.

The Centre for Organisational Excellence Research (COER) recently updated its research on the number of active Business Excellence (BE) awards in the world.

The new research revealed that 56 countries and 4 regions have active BE awards as of September 2020. In addition to these, 17 countries are running initiatives to encourage organisations on a BE journey. Therefore, in total 73 countries are promoting BE.

Eligibility of an award to be considered as an active BE award

BE awards were considered as “active” if:

• they were based on a holistic BE framework and use similar assessment methods to internationally recognised frameworks such as the EFQM Excellence Model and the Baldrige Excellence Framework;
• the award was run/held in 2018 or 2019 or planned for 2020 or 2021.

To review the countries that have BE awards or initiatives click here. Please inform us if our information on your country’s award is incorrect or missing.

The graph below shows the most common BE models for BE awards. Whilst there are 56 countries with active awards, some countries have more than one national award and there are also four international awards covering more than one country, these are Africa (Africa Excellence Award), Asia Pacific Quality Organisation (APQO), EFQM Excellence Award, and Iberoamerican Excellence Award (FUNDIBEC). Therefore, the graph shows the BE models used across a total of 71 awards.

The EFQM Excellence Model is the most popular with 24 BE awards using it. Another 5 BE awards use unique BE models that resemble the EFQM Excellence Model. The Baldrige Excellence Framework is used by 11 BE awards with another 11 using BE frameworks that resemble the Baldrige Excellence Framework. Fourteen BE awards use a unique BE model/ framework. Two BECs (Sheikh Khalifa Government Excellence Program of the UAE and Egypt) use the Government Excellence Model (GEM) and two (Dubai Government Excellence Programme and Abu Dhabi Award for Government Excellence) use unique models resembling the GEM.

The research on BE awards is part of a larger research study titled Excellence Without Borders (EWB) which was launched by COER in July 2018 and is supported by the Global Excellence Model Council. This research is investigating the current state of and best practices in designing BE frameworks/ models and promoting, facilitating, awarding, supporting, and measuring BE on a national/ regional and sectoral level.

A total of 26 countries (and 29 BE custodian organisations) have participated in the project. BE custodians are organisations responsible for designing BEFs, and for promoting facilitating BE and BE awards in their countries. Some countries had more than one BE custodian organisation participating in the project such as the Dubai Government Excellence Program (DGEP), Sheikh Khalifa Excellence Award (SKEA), and the Dubai Economy Department (DED) in the United Arab Emirates.

Initial EWB research findings are available here. Further findings are being made available through a series of academic research papers. It is envisaged that the research findings will lead to an improved understanding of BE and help BE Custodians to raise the profile and use of BE worldwide.