By Kim Bassett

As leaders in the industry, it is our responsibility to get people interested in pursuing a career in healthcare.  Mentorship is one way to encourage our youth towards a health career and can be used to encourage adults looking for a change in careers. 

You can be a mentor through formal programs, or more informally through casual interactions. Our work influences the lives of people we come in contact with every day.  Use this same influence to encourage new talent to pursue a health career.

Below are talking points you can use when persuading someone to consider a career in healthcare. [Read more…]

By Nick Hernandez

There are plenty of healthcare professional organizations, but are the yearly dues worth it to join? As budgets get squeezed, many physicians and practice managers have been cutting back on the number of professional associations they belong to. Although there is often a lack of perceived benefit, membership in professional associations yields a number of benefits.  Taking an active role in professional associations can benefit physicians through networking opportunities, policy alerts, and continuing education.

1. Education

Perhaps the most important benefit is education. (A plea here to physicians is to remember this applies to your practice managers. If you want a successful practice, run by a talented practice manager, you must be willing to support his or her professional continuing education.) Most associations provide an enormous amount of access to resource information such as: case studies, articles, white papers and books written by experts in your field or area of interest. Providers and managers can keep up with the newest developments (clinical and operational) through their association membership benefits, including conferences. Take advantage of all the information your associations provide and remember that most of it is online and free.

2. Networking

Another important benefit is networking. There is no better way to connect with peers and industry experts than through professional association membership. There is often a variety of possible venues to network at (e.g. listservs, membership connections and groups, national conferences, regional seminars, etc.), providing you are willing to get engaged with other members. Networking with professionals outside your place of employment can give you a broader perspective on the market and healthcare in general.  [Read more…]

By Kim Bassett

“The whole is better than the sum of its parts.” Aristotle said this an eon ago and it still holds true today. This is particularly important when putting together a high functioning leadership team.

There is no such thing as the perfect team and some of the best teams are not made up of “superstars.” The true power of a high performing team lies in how well each member clicks together. A team is better as the whole, not any one individual.

As the leader of such a team, you have to be on alert, tending the team, and assuring that everyone is in sync. Here are five key ways to build and keep a high performing leadership team. [Read more…]

By Kim Bassett

Everyone involved in providing healthcare to a patient is a leader, regardless of their position or job title.  The people that we care for often don’t understand what’s going on with them or why we are doing what we are doing.  They may not be familiar with the medical jargon used to describe a health condition or medical process that will be taking place to treat their condition.  It’s up to us, everyday leaders, to help them navigate the healthcare system.

Physicians, charge nurses, hospital management may be obvious leaders.  You will also find a leader in the security guard that helps a patient or visitor navigate through the hospital, the radiology technician that takes extra time to explain a particular test or procedure, and the nursing assistant that reminds their patient to call for help before getting out of bed.  Each of us help lead or guide our patients through the system.  [Read more…]

By Kim Bassett

Healthcare is an industry that prides itself on being inclusive of all races and sexes — an equal opportunity employer. And while this is true, there are still a surprisingly small number of women in the c-suite.

According to The Advisory Board Company, women make up 80% of healthcare workers, but only 40 % of positions at the executive level. It should be noted that many of those executive positions are in the human resources or nursing areas. 

If the statistics are stacked against you, how can you get to the table?

Below are three ways to help pave your path:

• Be visible. Put yourself out there and speak up. Get involved.  Volunteer for special projects.  Historically, the only way to get ahead was being part of the “good ole boys club.”  This “club” was/is all about relationship building.  You need to get in there and build these relationships.  Play the game. It may take a while to adjust your thinking, but even the men have to “play” this game. This doesn’t mean that you suddenly have to take up golf or hide your femininity. It just means to you have to network and be visible. Attend the functions, the meet and greets, have coffee.  This includes the informal “after work” social time.  Sometimes more work and relationship building takes place over a drink in an informal, unscheduled setting. 
• Get an influencer in your corner. Man or woman, it doesn’t matter. Find someone you respect and trust, and already has a seat at the table. Build a relationship with them.  Confide in them about your interest in professional growth. They’ve been where you are and can provide great career guidance and development. Ask them to assist you as you continue with your career path.
  
• Bring something to the table. Arguably this is the most important. If you want a seat at the table, be sure you bring something of tangible value. What differentiates you from the others? Develop and highlight these talents. Become known for being an expert in these areas. This will make you an asset.

[Read more…]

By Dennis Eder

Among the things I have enjoyed most during my three decades as a healthcare executive and consultant has been the past five years serving as a senior leader with the Practice Change Leaders for Aging and Health (“PCL”) program. Funded by The John A. Hartford Foundation Inc. and The Atlantic Philanthropies, this program’s singular purpose is “to develop, support and expand the influence of organizational leaders who are committed to achieving transformative improvements in care for older adults.” 

Under the direction of MacArthur Fellow and University of Colorado professor Eric A. Coleman, M.D., MPH, this program brings together a team of senior leaders who are not only experts in the field of geriatrics and community-based services, but who love to share their experience to each year’s cohort of change leaders. How we get to achieving the mission may evolve, but it is all about helping mid-career healthcare/community services professionals figure out how to develop and execute on improvements in care for elders.

Like so many of my peers, I’ve been involved both as a learner and a teacher in many other healthcare-related leadership programs, some of which have been worthwhile and some of which, sadly, have not. So what makes the PCL program so special, and what can other leadership programs learn from its success? Here are four takeaways learned from the trenches.

Ratio of Senior Leaders (“faculty”) to Change Leaders (“learners”) [Read more…]

By Nick Hernandez

Keeping track of contract renewals can be tedious. Whether practices renew such contracts all at once, or throughout the year, there are techniques to simplify the task.

A healthy practice is one that manages its contracts (vendor contracts, service agreements, and leases) well.  Many physicians and practice managers, however, are running nonstop and have never taken the time to track their practice’s contracts.  Just as clinical pathways promote organized and efficient patient care, effective contract management promotes organized, efficient, and cost-effective practice management.

There is actually a fairly simple method for headache-free contract tracking.  I have found that using an Excel spreadsheet in conjunction with Outlook tasks is a proven system to accomplish this.  Many contracts are auto-renewing (known as “evergreen”), meaning that once they are signed, they don’t terminate after a certain period but rather continue in effect.  Most people get so busy with their practice that after signing the contracts, no one is diligent about reviewing the agreements on an annual basis. [Read more…]

By Joe Tye and Bob Dent

Peter Drucker, who is widely credited with being the father of modern management, said that culture eats strategy for lunch. As we have recently seen in the examples of Wells Fargo, Fox News, Uber and most notably United Airlines, flaws in a company’s culture can wipe out all the gains it has achieved through business strategies. And when a culture tolerates inappropriate or toxic attitudes and behaviors, the actions of a handful of negative employees can unfairly tarnish everyone with a bad reputation.

Healthcare organizations are not immune to having negative cultures undo the positive effects of proactive strategies.

Over the past several years, the American Nurses Association, the Association of Critical Care Nurses, the Association of Perioperative Nurses and other healthcare professional associations have published white papers on incivility, bullying and lateral violence in the healthcare workplace. In our own research we found nearly 150 articles in the nursing literature on the subject of bullying. We collated the most recent 43 Culture Assessment Surveys from Values Coach healthcare clients with more than 11,000 individual responses to the question “Our people have positive attitudes at work, treat others with respect and do not engage in complaining, gossiping or finger-pointing.” More people disagreed than agreed with that statement and less than 5 percent strongly agreed.

In our book Building a Culture of Ownership in Healthcare we called this “the healthcare crisis within.” The negative cultures reflected in these results cause poor patient satisfaction, reduced productivity, impaired clinical quality and in the worst situations can contribute to patient deaths. In one survey of more than 4,500 healthcare professionals, 71 percent tied disruptive behavior, such as abusive, condescending or insulting personal conduct, to medical errors and 27 percent tied such behavior to patient deaths (reported by Christine Porath in the article “No Time to Be Nice at Work,” New York Times June 19, 2015). In her book Mastering Civility: A Manifesto for the Workplace Porath wrote, “After twenty years working in the field, I’m disappointed to report that the incivility problem still hasn’t been solved.” [Read more…]