| Quality Mix |
B.I.D.'s Century International Quality ERA Award to Turner Construction International in Geneva. The President of Turner Construction International, Ali H. Odeh, received the B.I.D. International Quality Award in Geneva. Ranked first in major segments of the world´s building trades, this company belongs to Turner Construction U.S.A., with an annual construction volume of 8.6 billion dollars. The Burj Dubai tower constitutes its most remarkable project as the world´s tallest skyscraper. 
B.I.D.'s World Quality Commitment Award to Tata Elxsi in Paris. Tata Elxsi’s General Manager of the Automotive Division, Ramanathan Natarajan, received the B.I.D. International Quality Award in Paris. Tata Elxsi belongs to Tata Group, one of India’s largest and oldest conglomerates with 98 companies and 289,500 employees in six continents. The company’s annual revenue amounts to 28.8 billion dollars and its market capitalization is 66.26 million dollars. 
B.I.D.'s International Star Award for Quality to RAO “UES of Russia” in Geneva. The Ex-Deputy-Prime Minister of the Russian Federation and Vice-Chairman of the Board of RAO “UES of Russia”, Sergey Dubinin, received the B.I.D. International Quality Award in Geneva. RAO “UES of Russia”, provides the 70% of electricity in Russia. With 600,000 employees, its market capitalization reaches 79 billion dollars. 
B.I.D.'s Quality Summit Award to Korea Electric Power Corporation in New York. The General Manager and CEO of the New York office of Korea Electric Power, Dong-Jun Kim, received the B.I.D. International Quality Award in New York. With their Headquarters in Seoul, Korea Electric Power, ranked 240th in the Fortune Global 500, has 20,898 employees and its assets amount to 73,9 billion dollars. 
B.I.D.'s International Star for Leadership in Quality to Reliance Energy in Paris. The Chief Engineer of Reliance Energy, Dhananjy Deshpande, received the B.I.D. International Quality Award in Paris, the same company having earlier received the B.I.D award in London. This multi-faceted Indian conglomerate of companies, belonging to the wealthiest family in the world, the Ambani family, is one of the top private sector businesses with a market capitalization of 81 billion dollars and 53 billion dollars, respectively.
Quality MixQuality Mix is a concept of multitasking in quality culture management with the aim of overcome competition. In 1984, the founder of Business Initiative Directions (B.I.D.), Jose E. Prieto, created the pioneering Quality Mix concept.
In past decades, through its continued process of innovation, Business Initiative Directions has succeeded in becoming one of the first four world-wide organizations to implement Quality Culture in top local, national, continental and global companies.
The Quality Mix concept is made up of six groups of actions which blend to achieve a process of constant quality improvement.
This process consists of a systematic analysis of the entire life cycle of a product or service, in order to obtain an advantageous position facing competitors. 1. QC 100: A Model of Total Quality ManagementTotal Quality Management was created by a necessity. In several studies, researchers such as Deming, Juran, Feigenbaum and Ishikawa have revealed weaknesses in many aspects of the organization of companies.
Addressing this weakness, the QC100 model presentes a management strategy which the main objective is the continuous improvement of quality.
This is possible by having a better knowledge and control of systems, including the design of the product or service, providers, materials, distribution, and information, involving internal procedures, customer and provider service, delays and after-sales service.
Hence, the main idea is to increase awareness of quality in all organizational processes of the company. When this is taken into consideration, it becomes totally clear the company has an enormous capacity for improving benefits and profitability if its quality standards are improved.
By doing this, the company will consistently provide its customers, internal or external, with products and services that satisfy their needs. High quality standards improved in productivity levels at a lower production costs made the company's overall costs also reduced. This renders to the company more competitive, not only due to its higher quality but also due to its reduced costs.
The Total Quality Management model has been widely used in manufacturing, education, government and service industries. It is considered "total" as it involves all the employees of the company as well as the organization as a whole.
The TQM model is composed of three main principles, as its name suggests:
The concept of quality includes customer satisfaction and is applied to the product and to the organization. Total quality goal is to obtain benefits for all the members and areas of the company, including manufacturing, sales, working conditions and training of its employees.
Quality is, therefore, a result of how a company is organized. 2. The AwardIn order to transmit quality culture, the international organization Business Initiative Directions (B.I.D.) grants the Quality Award to companies or organizations from around the world which promote excellence and innovation by implementing quality.
The award aims to:
1. Recognize the leadership in quality represented by the awarded company.
The award recognizes the commitment the company or organization has made with quality, business results, customer satisfaction, as well as the improvement of the relations with the employees, providers or anyone linked to the company.
On one hand, the award is a way of communicating the importance of quality for the company or organization. On the other hand, B.I.D. creates news about the award, from which a political and media campaign will be established.
The jury which annually chooses the awardees is formed by the leaders of previously awarded companies.
The companies are chosen to receive the award by a jury formed by the leaders of previously awarded companies and votes made through other channels established by B.I.D., during the annual meetings in New York, London, Paris, Geneva, Frankfurt, and Madrid.
Leading companies can also vote by post, using an official ballot previously sent to them by B.I.D., or via Internet.
The evaluation criteria are based on the following QC100 TQM principles:
B.I.D.'s Selection Committee consists on a group of international experts in business communication formed by engineers, physicists, mathematicians, economists, psychologists, sociologists, journalists, designers and architects who research a maximum of public or private resources.
B.I.D. has taken into account the selection processes and technology of the most prestigious awards in the world (the Nobel Prize in Sweden, the Oscars in Hollywood, the Malcolm Baldridge Award in the USA, the Deming Award in Japan, as well as other awards) to obtain their strong points and to improve the selection of the companies. 3. Communication and MediaIn order to transmit quality culture, the Quality Mix approach uses all communication media, especially the most modern ones, including the Internet and related tools, blogs, videos, twitter and social networks.
ImarPress is the main sponsor of the conventions organized by B.I.D. in London, Paris, New York, Frankfurt, Geneva and Madrid.
Therefore, every time a company receives a B.I.D. international quality award, the news is spread, emphasizing the company's aim to provide its customers with products and services that meet their needs.
Furthermore, the press releases distributed by B.I.D. are published in all the countries of the world.
ImarPress, with its publications in English, Spanish, French and Russian, offer wide media coverage of the awarded companies.
Some of ImarPress' publications are 4AM (For All Markets), GPerson, InvEurope, B2People, GatewayCNet, Quality Update. In YouTube: ImarPress, ImarPressTV, BIDWorld.
The Quality Mix model has been translated into the major languages of the world and, in a few months, it will be available in more than 100 languages. 4. Marketing Boomerang
The news of the award and its graphic representation are used by the awarded company as in a symbol of strength.
The logo of the award is present in all conventional marketing channels already in use by the company: containers, packaging, advertisements, signs, brochures, sales points, trade fairs, stands, commercial areas, transportation, uniforms, buildings and corporate gifts.
Using the symbol of the award in the established marketing channels does not mean an increase in costs; it only supports publicity over the award.
"Boomerang" is a marketing action in which a small investment, in this case printing the logo of the award on the company's marketing materials, will return to the company as profit.
For over 20 years, B.I.D. has been receiving information showing the increase in sales in companies which have used the logo of the award. 5. Image EndorsementIn modern communication, image endorsement is being increasingly used, especially by the world’s top companies.
Image endorsement could be defined as a group of actions in which the important symbols of the world are used as support, such as cities, national symbols, sports, famous scientists, artists and celebrities. Consumers see each part separately, but perceive them as part of a whole.
The most important sports events of the world are the best example of image endorsement, and are highly valued by the top companies of the world.
By organizing conventions in the most emblematic places of the world, B.I.D. utilizes the image endorsement of those countries, cities and buildings.
To make the image endorsement more effective, B.I.D. offers media coverage that utilizes the most sophisticated material, recording each convention in high resolution and with multiple cameras, so that business leaders can present their success stories and obtain the maximum benefit from those meetings.
In recent decades, B.I.D. has been gathering a large amount of recorded material which has become an important asset for image endorsement, allowing the constant release of news about the awarded companies, where quality is in the forefront of their performance. 6. Quality as a Political CampaignB.I.D.'s Quality Mix model constitutes a novelty in marketing and communication as it transmits quality culture by means of a political campaign.
Politics is necessary to manage the future of social needs, as well as individuals and business needs.
In this way, a comunication political campaign is based on a format where business leaders propose solutions and the media spread them to society, which evaluates their proposals and accepts those which best address their problems for the future.
B.I.D. thinks of business leaders as politicians who represent the interests of their shareholders, employees, providers and other people linked to their companies.
Hence, B.I.D.'s Quality Mix model transmits quality culture utilizing a visual format similar to that used by political parties. The Quality Mix model uses the following methodology as a political campaign:
|
