In 1983, President and Chief Operating Officer, Horst Schulze, decided on a strategy to manage the Ritz Carlton to compete on quality. The strategy affected the entire organization, with significant differences in: · Defining the characteristics of all company products defined in the corporate credo · Translating the credo into basic standards to clarify employee responsibilities · Personally training employees on the new Ritz credo -Carlton and Core Standards (the Gold Standards) · Aggressively instilling a passion for excellenceFive years later, Schulze began using the Malcolm Baldridge National Quality Award criteria to develop a system of corporate excellence. This system used the Deming Wheel to achieve optimal performance levels throughout the organization. With these new policies in place, Schulze led Ritz Carlton to the first recipient of the Malcolm Baldridge National Quality Award for Service. The summary of the 1999 Ritz-Carlton application is as follows: Criterion 1: Leadership "Plan": There are seven specific decisions collectively made by senior leaders to set the direction toward business excellence: · 10-year vision · Strategy · 5-year Mission · Methods · 3-year Goal · Foundation · 1-year Tactic Senior leaders formed the Gold Standards, which include the Creed, Basics, Three Phases of Service, Motto, and Employee Promise . Together, Gold Standards have the ability to empower employees to take the lead in thinking and acting with innovation and independence, for the overall benefit of not only the company, but also customers. “Doing” – Specific actions by senior executives to adequately manage the new leadership approach consist of three salient processes: Ensuring that the goods and services of each new hotel are characteristic of all other Ritz Carltons on the day of inauguration. · The results of seven specific decisions defined during the annual ..... . middle of the sheet... as well as employee satisfaction factors.7.4 Supplier and Partner Results The Ritz-Carlton ensures that its suppliers' performance requirements are met through an in-depth supplier compliance and quality survey that measures key aspects of quality of suppliers. Purchasing staff at each hotel fills out the survey every six months and evaluates specific issues, such as suitability for use, accuracy and service, etc. Vendors earning an overall rating of 80% or higher on all attributes meet Ritz-Carlton's quality requirements. 7.5 Organizational Effectiveness Results Ritz-Carlton's systematic preventative maintenance CARE program has maintained their properties and equipment at world-class levels at reduced costs. This is in line with their goal of pursuing a defect-free environment. With low unemployment and stiff competition for skilled workers, the Ritz-Carlton has undertaken a major project to improve the cycle time from when a potential new hire comes on board. he brings it and is given a job offer. Using quality science approaches, the Ritz-Carlton improved cycle time from 21 days in 1996 to just 1 day in 1996. 1999.