Over the past 25 years, Business Excellence Models – such as the one supporting the Malcom Baldrige National Quality Award or the Excellence Model and corresponding Awards given by the European Foundation for Quality Management – have been used in the scope of helping organizations attain performance excellence and sustain that organizational level. In the last few years, however, the engagement of manufacturing and operations firms has been declining consistently. Based on the available evidence from literature and on official figures of the engagement with Business Excellence Models, we analyze some of the possible reasons for that decline and review the main organizational challenges in sustaining excellence over time.

The contribution of this paper is to raise the discussion over the role and current challenges of these Models in promoting and sustaining Excellence, and draw some conclusions on the key importance of people (both the leadership and the workforce) in making Business Excellence initiatives sustainable. With this work, we hope to clarify perspectives around these initiatives and to reinforce the importance for an excellence-oriented culture in sustaining excellence in manufacturing organizations.