Business Excellence

The University’s strategic plan sets out challenging aims, the successful achievement of which requires careful management and coordination, effective monitoring and control. The targets we have set mean that we must stand out in our chosen markets as being a credible and effective provider, especially in the rapidly developing and highly competitive Higher Education market . We must, therefore, continuously manage ourselves in a way that helps us to achieve a reputation for excellence in all that we deliver. The University has adopted the European Foundation for Quality Management (EFQM) Excellence Model® as its management system framework. The model is based on the Fundamental Concepts of Excellence that are embedded in our mission, purpose and values.

The Business Excellence initiative is a long-term University commitment to achieving the very highest levels of management performance in support of our core academic objectives. It incorporates a number of university wide improvement initiatives driven by the Director of Business Excellence, but undertaken by designated senior staff and cross-university teams.

The University undertook an initial self-assessment against the rigors of the Excellence Model® in 2002/03, and has repeated these assessments every 18-24 months.  More recently, as our approaches to excellence have developed and matured, we have tested these against other organisations by competing in the UK and European Award schemes.  This is an immensely challenging process, involving teams of 6 – 8 experienced excellence assessors visiting the University for a week, after having undertaken many days studying our submission documentation. The reward from this process is a valuable feedback report, which outlines the University’s strengths, alongside those areas that will benefit from further improvement.  These improvements form part of the objectives of SMG members for the following year.

The University became the first in Europe to achieve a full award under the EFQM Excellence Model when we won the UK Excellence Award in 2008, organised by the prestigious British Quality Foundation (BQF), and at our first attempt.  Subsequently we have been recognised as finalists in the EFQM Excellence Award Process in 2009 and 2010, and we continue to benefit from the process of award assessment.  Staff can access the feedback reports from our external assessments through the links above (requires LJMU user id and password).

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