SHELTON, WA – Winfried Danke, Chief Operating Officer at Mason Health in Shelton, has been selected for participation in the Baldrige Performance Excellence Program this year. Danke is one of 17 leaders from throughout the nation who are set to begin a year-long leadership development journey in the prestigious Baldrige Executive Fellows Program in April 2025. The competitively selected fellows will gain one-on-one access to Baldrige Award recipients — nationally recognized, role-model organizations across all sectors of the U.S. economy.

Danke has extensive senior leadership experience in healthcare, including with rural health systems.

“I am honored to have been selected for this prestigious executive leadership program, and I am looking forward to applying advanced performance management concepts and techniques from the fellowship to help Mason Health achieve performance excellence,” Danke said. “Becoming a Baldrige Fellow will make me a better leader.”

Through planned visits to Baldrige Award recipient sites across the United States, as well as networking with other executives, the new Baldrige Fellows will study how world-class U.S. organizations and their senior leaders achieve strategic and operational excellence and stimulate innovation. Within a collegial environment, they will have a unique opportunity to compare the perspectives of executives across sectors, share candid advice on leadership challenges, and use the insights they gain to address a strategic challenge or opportunity within their own organizations as part of individual capstone projects.

“Winfried brings a highly approachable and collaborative leadership style that aligns well with our culture at Mason Health,” said Mason Health CEO Eric Moll. “Throughout his career, he has worked with organizations to improve population health through collaboration. His experience is undoubtedly of great benefit to our patients, community members and teams across the District.”

Since its inception in 2010, the Baldrige Executive Fellows Program has graduated more than 168 executives. Graduates’ capstone projects have documented the wide-ranging improvements they’ve designed, including overhauling strategic planning processes, innovating supplier networks, creating high-reliability health care organizations, lessening patients’ reliance on opioids after surgery, improving employee engagement, engaging physicians, overhauling communication processes for dispersed workforces, standardizing work processes, better preparing students for professional careers, and reimagining population health and community health outcomes.

“The Baldrige Executive Fellows Program is the only executive leadership fellowship that provides one-on-one access to Baldrige Award recipients and the opportunity to learn role-model management strategies from these high-performing executives,” said Laurie Locascio, Under Secretary of Commerce for Standards and Technology at the National Institute of Standards and Technology. “Now is a perfect time for executives with vision and foresight to understand and apply the Baldrige concepts as a means to improving their organization and its sustainability.”

Fellows have come from all sectors of the U.S. economy and have visited and personally met with hundreds of Baldrige Award recipient senior leaders, visiting facilities, factories, hospital floors, hotels, restaurants, parks, and airports, among other sites, to build understanding of role-model strategies to lead a high-performing organization.

Learn more about the Baldrige Fellows and how to apply.

In conjunction with NIST and the private sector, the Baldrige Program manages the Baldrige Award, which was established by Congress in 1987. The Baldrige Program also offers the Baldrige Excellence Framework: Proven leadership and management practices for high performance.

Mason Health, Public Hospital District No. 1 of Mason County is ISO 9001 Quality Management System certified by Det Norske Veritas (DNV) and is a licensed and accredited acute care hospital with a level four emergency trauma designation. Mason General Hospital and Mason Clinic are ENERGY STAR® certified, and Mason Health is the recipient of one Practice Greenhealth Environmental Excellence Award, three Partner for Change Awards, two Greening the Operating Room Awards and the Making Medicine Mercury Free Award. To learn more about Mason Health’s sustainability efforts, visit https://www.masonhealth.com/ab.... There are more than 100 physicians on staff in 19 specialties. For more information or to find a health care provider, visit www.masonhealth.com. To learn more about DNV, visit www.dnv.com/healthcare.