Setting the standard for excellence

Investors in Excellence is a new programme designed to drive improvement in all key areas of an organisation, including leadership, processes, people and customer results.

Comprehensive support is provided throughout the programme, designed to help drive continuous improvement at a pace to suit the organisation.

Achieving the standard usually involves several stages, at the end of which the organisation is recognised with accreditation.

What is Investors in Excellence?

Investors in Excellence (IiE) is a mark of achievement that allows organisations to demonstrate their performance against the Excellence Model.

IiE is demanding and cannot be achieved without meeting a defined standard against each criterion of the Excellence Model. In each case there is a set of indicators and for each indicator the applicant must provide evidence of achievement. Because the Excellence Model deals with every aspect of an organisation, IiE recognition is the most powerful evidence of an organisation's capabilities and performance available.

Who is IiE for?

IiE will be attractive to a wide range of organisations in the private and public sectors as it provides evidence of a verified quality standard. For example, companies that are tendering for business are invariably asked for evidence of their quality standards.

IiE is also the perfect solution for large companies with many sites, offices or business units, each of which they want to achieve a certain level of performance against the Excellence Model. The same applies to local or central government organisations.

How does IiE work?

IiE accreditation is based on the nine criteria of the Excellence Model and the process for its achievement will have four phases:

1.      COMMITMENT
An applicant formally commits to becoming an Investor in Excellence.

2.      DIAGNOSIS
The applicant undertakes a systematic self assessment using the Excellence Model led by a BQF adviser which leads to a gap analysis against the IiE standard. The diagnostic tool is the UK Excellence Federation's beta plus which is a simple and powerful process for identifying the areas in which the organisation needs to improve. This process results in an action plan which tells the organisation what it has to do in order to achieve Investors in Excellence recognition.

3.      DELIVERY
The applicant works to close the identified gaps. In this phase the adviser can provide further support if required.

4.      ASSESSMENT AND RECOGNITION
When the applicant decides that they are ready to be assessed, a written submission for certification is prepared. A licensed assessor will then undertake a desk top assessment of the submission and a site visit. Based upon the results of this assessment, a recommendation will be made as whether or not the applicant meets the IiE certification requirements.