Business excellence

Philips continuously explores new ways to improve products and to offer innovative products to its consumers. That’s why we have created a program through which we will reach higher and higher quality levels in all products and services. In fact, this quality improvement program affects all our employees and all our processes, in every country, division or department, encompassing everyone from Board of Management to the shop floor.

'BEST' - BUSINESS EXCELLENCE THROUGH SPEED AND TEAMWORK

The BEST program is the path we have chosen to achieve business excellence. It describes a set of methods and tools by which we continuously improve our efforts. Previous successful initiatives are incorporated in the program to make sure we learn as much as possible from our successes in the past.

We are all committed to improving processes in-line with the company’s strategic targets. To this end, has  adopted BEST to reach this goal. It is our ambition to be one of the best companies in the world: the best to trade with, work for, and invest in.

• Customers are fully satisfied by the quality of our products and services
• Employees develop and use their full potential
• Shareholders get a premium return on their investment
• Suppliers choose to work with us as this generates superior value for both
• The larger community appreciates our contribution to the quality of life

Speed and Teamwork lie at the heart of the BEST initiative. Each and every individual within Philips knows that only by fully cooperating and working together will we be able to perfect our business processes. That's why we focus on:

Working more smartly and reducing the cycle-time of processes

Working in teams and learning from the best practices of others

There are several tools and approaches in the BEST initiative. The core tool that is used to assess business maturity and direct improvement is the Philips Business Excellence (PBE) model. This is an exact copy of the Excellence model of the European Foundation for Quality Management (EFQM).

The PBE tool is suported by many other tools, such as Breakthrough Management, Balanced Scorecard, One Page Strategy and Process Survey tools (PST).

PSTs are maturity grids designed around specific processes, they give a clear insight in the areas for improvement and help to identify which steps should be taken to reach those improvement targets.

The PSTs are fully compatible with the EFQM's widely-used excellence model, and have been provided to the EFQM free-of-charge.

To order PSTs from EFQM, visit:

• www.efqm.org