Trends in EFQM criterion weights; the case of Denmark 1998‐2001

This paper examines the criterion weights of the EFQM excellence model. More and more research indicates that the official criterion weights from EFQM do not correspond with the way companies are working. This, of course, raises the question whether or not it makes any sense to compare companies according to an arbitrary weight structure, which has never been empirically tested? In this paper the criterion weights are estimated through the use of a factor scores regression based on confirmatory factor analysis of a number of bootstrapped samples. This estimation procedure is applied on data collected among Danish companies which responded to a self‐assessment questionnaire covering the EFQM excellence model in each of the years 1998‐2001. The overall conclusions are that the allocation of weights is fairly stable for most of the criteria except for one. The weight allocated to “People results” is significantly lower in 2001 than in 1999 and 1998.