About CAF

 
History and growth
The CAF is a result of co-operation among the EU Ministers responsible for Public Administration. It is jointly developed under the aegis of the Innovative Public Services Group (IPSG), a working group of national experts set up by the Directors-General (DG) in order to promote exchanges and cooperation where it concerned innovative ways of modernizing government and public service delivery in EU Member States.
 
A pilot version was presented in May 2000 and a first revised version was launched in 2002. A CAF Resource Centre CAF (RC) was created at the European Institute of Public Administration (EIPA) in Maastricht following the decision of DGs in charge of public service. In a strategic statement, EIPA pointed out how it wants to play its role as a European CAF Resource Centre and what its objectives are in this respect.
Together with the network of national CAF correspondents, assisted by the European Foundation for Quality Management (EFQM) and the University of Speyer, the CAF RC coached the implementation of the model in many ways and evaluated its use. Between 2000 and 2005 ca. 900 European public administrations used the CAF to improve their organisations. Also from outside Europe there is a lot of interest in using the tool e.g. from China, Middle East, Dominican Republic and Brazil.
More than 300 CAF users met at the 1st and 2nd European CAF Users Events in Rome in 2003 and in Luxembourg in 2005. Two studies by EIPA, established in the context of these events, give detailed information on the use of CAF in Europe and they inspired the CAF 2006 revision.
A database on CAF applications is being further developed at EIPA, allowing integrating good practices in public administrations from all over Europe and maybe wider. A CAF e-tool will be soon fully available for the CAF community. The CAF website gives all the available information on the European level. The model is now translated in 19 languages. But also on the national level, many countries developed CAF support structures including training, e-tools, brochures, CAF users' events and CAF data bases. All these activities assure all the CAF actors involved that the target of 2000 registered CAF users in 2010 - set by the United Kingdom presidency - will be met.
 
The Ministers responsible for Public Administration in the European Union expressed at the end of the Luxemburg presidency on 8 June 2005 their appreciation for the fruitful exchange of ideas, experiences and good/best practices between the Public Administrations of the EU Member states within the European Public Administration Network (EPAN) and for the development and use of tools such as the Common Assessment Framework. They asked to integrate even more the quality approach with the Lisbon agenda. The CAF 2006 revision has taken this demand into account.
 
Context of the CAF
The CAF is an easy-to-use, free tool to assist public-sector organisations across Europe in using quality management techniques to improve performance. The CAF provides a self-assessment framework which is conceptually similar to the major Total Quality models, in particular the Excellence Model of the European Foundation for Quality Management (EFQM), but which is especially designed for public-sector organisations, taking into account their characteristics.
 
The CAF has four main purposes:
  1. To introduce public administrations to the principles of TQM and gradually guide them, through the use and understanding of self-assessment, from the current "Plan-Do" sequence of activities to a full fledged "Plan-Do-Check-Act (PCDA)" cycle;
  2. To facilitate the self-assessment of a public organisation in order to arrive at a diagnosis and improvement actions;
  3. To act as a bridge across the various models used in quality management;
  4. To facilitate bench-learning between public-sector organisations.
 
CAF 2006
A pilot version of the CAF was presented in May 2000 and a first revised version was launched in 2002. Since then, nearly 900 public organisations have used the CAF. On the basis of their experiences and in the spirit of continuous improvement, a third revision was undertaken in 2006. The CAF 2006 was launched at the 4th European Quality Conference in Finland in September 2006.
 
Target Organisations
The CAF has been designed for use in all parts of the public sector at the national/federal, regional and local level. It may also be used under a wide variety of circumstances, e.g. as part of a systematic programme of reform or as a basis for targeting improvement efforts in specific public-service organisations. In some cases, and especially in very large
organisations, a self-assessment may also be undertaken in part of an organisation, e.g. in a selected section or department.
 
Structure
 
Main characteristics
Using the CAF provides an organisation with a powerful framework to initiate a process of continuous improvement. The CAF provides:
  • an assessment based on evidence, against a set of criteria which has become widely accepted across the public sector in Europe;
  • opportunities to identify progress and outstanding levels of achievement;
  • a means to achieve consistency of direction and consensus on what needs to be done to improve an organisation;
  • a link between the different results to be achieved and supportive practices or enablers;
  • a means to create enthusiasm among employees by involving them in the improve­ment process; 
  • opportunities to promote and share good practice within different areas of an organisation and with other organisations;
  •  a means to integrate various quality initiatives into normal business operations;
  • a means of measuring progress over time through periodic self-assessment.