How can we build a more effective system around the great people we work with?

Editor’s note: We welcome Andrew as the latest blogger to join our healthcare managers on CanadianHealthcareNetwork.ca. He invites feedback at his contacts listed below. Operational excellence is a mind-set, not a tool or a methodology and there are specific characteristics that excellent organizations have.They pursue excellence in everything they do. They empower front line employees to use judgment and make decisions. They focus on outcomes and results and only perform activities that align with those desired outcomes and results. They hire the best people and are able to keep the ones they want. They effectively implement new ideas and integrate them into the way the organization operates. They have great leaders throughout the organization and cultivate those leaders. They focus on innovation and collaboration. They know when to speed up and when to slow down operations in order to maximize performance.After reading these characteristics, how many healthcare organizations would you consider to be excellent? My guess is not many. It’s a scary thought that the organizations responsible for taking care of our population are not performing as well as they could be.And it’s not their fault. We have trained our healthcare institutions and their leaders to be risk averse and overly cautious. Not just with patient care, but with the business decisions they make. We have trained our healthcare suppliers to jump through hoops to try and develop new business, even when they have a product or service that can improve patient care. We have trained our patients to expect the worst when it comes to wait times and access to care. We have allowed the public to have access to any piece information they want at any time. We have scrutinized every penny spent and heavily criticized those very same leaders we ask to transform our healthcare system.Yet we still make it work and have some of the most engaging people anywhere. People who come to work passionate about what they do and whose sole purpose in life is to make people feel better, both physically and emotionally. This happens despite the broken system we have around them. Imagine how much more these people could shine if we built a more effective system around them?My promise to you is that every week, I will do my best to provide insights that can help improve our healthcare system so we can transform it into something we can all be proud of.Andrew Miller is a leading expert in operational excellence, whose healthcare clients include hospitals, global healthcare suppliers, shared service organizations, group purchasing organizations, private clinics, industry associations, and government institutions. He helps his clients maximize profitability and performance by integrating strategies around driving innovation and collaboration, improving customer on boarding and retention, aligning strategy and execution, hiring and retaining top people, and optimizing speed.His forthcoming book, Redefining Operational Excellence: New Strategies for Maximizing Performance and Profits Across the Organization, will be published by AMACOM and is due out in June. Click here to pre-order the book.Andrew has launched a new teleconference series for 2014, How to Transform Healthcare Through Operational Excellence, and is offering a 25% discount for members of the Canadian Healthcare Manager community. Stay tuned for more details coming soon. To contact Andrew call 416-817-1336 or email andrew@acmconsulting.ca.

How can we build a more effective system around the great people we work with?

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Andrew Miller