SUPPORTING STATEMENT
U.S. Department of Commerce
National Institute of Standards and Technology
Malcolm Baldrige National Award and Examiner Applications
OMB CONTROL NO. 0693-0006
A. JUSTIFICATION
This submission is to extend the approval by the Office of Management and Budget.
1. Explain the circumstances that make the collection of information necessary.
The Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Improvement Act of 1987, Public Law 100-107, established an annual U.S. National Quality Award (Award). The purposes of the Award are to promote competitiveness and quality awareness, recognize the performance achievements of U.S. companies, and to share successful strategies and practices. The law explicitly states that “An organization may qualify for an award only if it permits a rigorous evaluation of the way in which its business and other operations have contributed to improvements in quality.” This rigorous evaluation starts with a thorough review by volunteer Baldrige Examiners of application packages submitted to the Award Administrator (currently the American Society for Quality [ASQ]), by companies wishing to be considered for the Award. The law also states that the Director of NIST “…shall rely upon an intensive evaluation by a competent board of examiners… . The examination should encompass all aspects of the organization’s current practice of quality management.”
To save organizations paperwork, time, and effort, potential applicants establish their eligibility for one of the Award categories—Business, which encompasses manufacturing companies or subsidiaries, service companies or subsidiaries, and small businesses; and Education, Health Care, or Nonprofit.
If eligible, Award applicants provide detailed information on seven areas of their quality management system. These areas are: (1) Leadership; (2) Strategic Planning; (3) Customer Focus; (4) Measurement, Analysis, and Knowledge Management; (5) Workforce Focus,
(6) Process Management, and (7) Results.
In parallel, highly qualified experts from across the nation apply to become members of the Baldrige Board of Examiners. The selection process ensures that outstanding individuals from each of the sectors in which the Award is given are chosen. The members of the Board of Examiners are appointed for a one-year period.
2. Explain how, by whom, how frequently, and for what purpose the information will be used. If the information collected will be disseminated to the public or used to support information that will be disseminated to the public, then explain how the collection complies with all applicable Information Quality Guidelines.
Each year, for-profit and non-profit organizations from the business, education, and health care sectors of the economy, and public and private non-profit organizations, including government, apply for the Malcolm Baldrige Quality Award. The applications contain information and quantitative data voluntarily provided by Award applicants to be used as the basis for a rigorous evaluation by Baldrige Examiners. These evaluations determine each applicant’s quality achievements and performance improvements, and which, if any, organizations will receive the Award. The President of the United States presents the Award.
The application form consists of two pages; the report, which is an attachment to the form, consists of an organizational profile and response by the applicant to the seven areas just described. Instructions and applications (Baldrige Award Application Forms) are downloadable from the Internet.
The information collected on the Examiners application is used by the Program to select highly-qualified applicants for seats on the Baldrige Board of Examiners.
The information, consisting of, the application summaries from the Award recipients after proprietary information is removed, will be disseminated to the public. The collection and dissemination complies with the NIST Chief information Officer (CIO) Information Quality Guidelines and Standards.
3. Describe whether, and to what extent, the collection of information involves the use of automated, electronic, mechanical, or other technological techniques or other forms of information technology.
The Award eligibility and application forms are filled out via word processing and submitted as hard copy or a compact disk. The Examiner Application is completed and submitted electronically via the Internet.
The Program has made it possible for applicants to submit applications electronically – makes all necessary forms and instructions available and are downloadable from the Baldrige Program Web site, http://baldrige.nist.gov/, but the majority of applicants prefer to use the manual process due to the need for an original signature. It should also be noted that many small businesses, schools, and health care providers either do not have the capability to transmit their information in a safe and secure manner, or they prefer to transmit by hard copy to protect their proprietary information. The Baldrige National Quality Program continuously reexamines and improves the application procedures and requirements. The Program’s goal is to keep to a minimum the amount of information and data requested. The information required is the minimum needed to allow the Examiners and the Panel of Judges to deliberate, to ensure the integrity of the Award selection process, and to recommend Award recipients.
4. Describe efforts to identify duplication.
There is no duplication or repetitive information requested of applicants for the Award or to become a member of the Board of Examiners since the information format in both cases is unique. The information is specific to the applicant organization and therefore unlikely to be available from any other source. The information required is sufficiently detailed to allow an
in-depth evaluation of the applicant’s quality system by experts selected to serve on the Baldrige Board of Examiners.
As with the Award application, the information requested is unique to the Board of Examiners. In either case, whether submitting an application for the Award or to be a Member of the Board of Examiners, the applicant can modify and reuse any relevant information from prior applications.
The Baldrige Criteria and application processes were developed with extensive input and regular review by private sector sources. The Criteria and supporting Award processes are evaluated and updated annually through a variety of feedback mechanisms, including applicant input. The Examiner application and selection processes used to determine members of the Board of Examiners are also evaluated and updated annually, using the same feedback mechanisms to eliminate burdensome requirements.
5. If the collection of information involves small businesses or other small entities, describe the methods used to minimize burden.
As small businesses are a high priority of NIST’s Baldrige National Quality Program, there is a small business Award. Small businesses are subject to the same evaluation criteria and review process as other applicants. As with all applicants, small businesses can submit a basic application report of any length up to 50 pages. Thus, a small business can limit its paperwork burden to whatever it wishes to produce. Also, since the report documents the organization’s business results and the quality program and processes already in place, only current and trend information on hand is relevant. No new information is required. The applicant simply needs to organize existing information. Most importantly, the application for the Award is strictly voluntary, as is the application to become a member of the Baldrige Board of Examiners. Therefore the burden falls only on those individuals and organizations who choose to submit applications. All applicant-relevant Baldrige material is posted on the Internet to ensure ease of access.
To save applicants time and effort, returning Examiners are provided with the information submitted in prior years and need only amend the facts as needed.
6. Describe the consequences to the Federal program or policy activities if the collection is not conducted or is conducted less frequently.
The consequences to the Federal program of not collecting the voluntary information are that (1) we would violate our statutory responsibilities; (2) the Award Program would be unable to provide useful, objective, comprehensive written feedback to applicants; (3) organizations could not compete for the Award, thus losing the constructive benefits of the review by a team of outside Baldrige Examiners and the motivational and self-discovery aspects of the application report-writing process; (4) the President would be unable to present any Awards and therefore not confer the status of a world-class organization on any American organizations; and
(5) ultimately the progress made in building the competitiveness of U.S. industrial, educational, health care, and nonprofit organizations would suffer.
Also, it should be noted that the consequences to the Federal program of not collecting the voluntary information requested in the application to become a Member of the Board of Examiners are identical. Without the Board of Examiners, an evaluation of the applications for the Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award cannot be conducted.
7. Explain any special circumstances that require the collection to be conducted in a manner inconsistent with OMB guidelines.
The Award Program requires thirty (30) copies for distribution to the Board of Examiners in order to complete the review process in an expeditious manner.
8. Provide information of the PRA Federal Register notice that solicited public comments on the information collection prior to this submission. Summarize the public comments received in response to that notice and describe the actions taken by the agency in response to those comments. Describe the efforts to consult with persons outside the agency to obtain their views on the availability of data, frequency of collection, the clarity of instructions and recordkeeping, disclosure, or reporting format (if any), and on the data elements to be recorded, disclosed, or reported.
A Federal Register Notice soliciting public comment was published on October 30, 2009. No public comments were received from this notice.
9. Explain any decisions to provide payments or gifts to respondents, other than remuneration of contractors or grantees.
No payments or gifts are given to respondents.
10. Describe any assurance of confidentiality provided to respondents and the basis for assurance in statute, regulation, or agency policy.
The respondents (applicants) are assured of confidentiality as a matter of agency policy. This assurance is made on the basis of the exemption under the Freedom of Information Act for proprietary information provided by a business to a government. All applicants and applications are treated as confidential. Further, Award recipients are not required to share proprietary information even if such information was part of their Award application.
The Examiners are assigned in such a way as to avoid conflicts of interest. All Examiners sign nondisclosure agreements. All Judges, Members of the Board of Examiners, and NIST staff receive annual confidentiality training.
11. Provide additional justification for any questions of a sensitive nature, such as sexual behavior and attitudes, religious beliefs, and other matters that are commonly considered private.
This information collection does not include questions of a sensitive nature, such as sexual behavior and attitudes, religious beliefs, and other matters that are commonly considered private. However, the Secretary of Commerce and the Director of NIST are responsible for determining that an applicant would be an appropriate role model and therefore should be approved as a Baldrige Award recipient. For role model determination, NIST conducts record checks on potential Award recipients to ensure compliance with legal and regulatory requirements.
12. Provide an estimate in hours of the burden of the collection of information.
Our estimate of the total burden of the collection of information is 8,200 hours.
The total number of respondents is 900 (Award applicants is 100, and Examiner applicants is 800).
The total number of annual responses is 900.
The total annual hours requested is 8,200 (74 hours X 100 for Award applicants = 7,400; and 1 hour X 800 = 800)
The current OMB inventory is 7,800.
The difference is 400. This program change is due to the increase of time requested for Examiner applications from 30 minutes to 1 hour.
Provide an estimate of the total annual cost burden to the respondents or record
keepers resulting from the collection (excluding the value of the burden hours in
Question 12 above).
Our estimate of the total annual cost burden resulting from the collections is $125,000.
This total annual cost results from application fee, printing, binding, and shipping costs associated with the Award applications.
The total number of Award application respondents is 100.
The total number of annual responses is 100.
The estimated total cost is $1,250 per Award applicant.
The estimate of the total annual cost burden is 100 x $1,250 = $125,000
The current OMB cost is $0.
14. Provide estimates of annualized cost to the Federal government.
There are no more than nominal staff and overhead costs to the Federal government for the collection of this information, as the major costs of printing, distribution, and shipping are contractor-absorbed and covered by funds from the Foundation for the Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award, a private nonprofit charitable corporation.
15. Explain the reasons for any program changes or adjustments.
An adjustment increase in the burden hours is due to a reevaluation of the average time per response for the Board of Examiners application, increasing from 30 minutes to 60 minutes, for a total increase of 400 hours.
An adjustment increase in the cost burden for award applicants was not included in the previous request. This increase is for the application fee ($150 per applicant), printing, binding, and shipping the applications. The increase is from $0 to $125,000.
16. For collections whose results will be published, outline the plans for tabulation and publication.
There are no plans for publishing the results of the collected information.
17. If seeking approval to not display the expiration date for OMB approval of the information collection, explain the reasons why display would be inappropriate.
No such approval is requested.
18. Explain each exception to the certification statement.
No exceptions to the certification statement are requested.
B. COLLECTIONS OF INFORMATION EMPLOYING STATISTICAL METHODS
This collection of information does not employ statistical methods.
| File Type | application/msword |
| File Title | SUPPORTING STATEMENT |
| Author | Darla Yonder |
| File Modified | 2010-02-12 |
| File Created | 2010-01-08 |