To reach your destination, start where you are now

Improving patient satisfaction, streamlining workflows, cutting waste: Frontline leaders came to the Union Delegate Conference eager to dive into a host of performance issues. But jumping into the deep water can be dangerous. 

“Before you start changing something in your department, understand how it currently works. Document the process from the patient and member’s perspective.” In short, chart it. That was the message Dennis Deas, senior director, Health Care Performance Improvement, delivered at his workshop Chart Us, March 13. 

“People want to jump to the solution” when trying to improve performance, he said.  “But we have to understand the totality of the work—what’s working and what’s not—or when we try to make a fix in one corner of the system, something else pops up in another corner.” 

Charting a work process is a three-step process:

• Understand the current state by mapping the work process;
• Identify opportunities for improvement and develop a theory about how and what to fix;
• Determine how to create a sustainable future state by using small tests of change. 

The charting process begins with team members using Post-it notes to identify and sequence each step in a work process. They then identify obstacles, stress points or waste found along the way. In patient care, those points of stress or waste often take the form of waiting time. 

In a hands-on exercise, workshop participants charted a process most of them were familiar with—launching a unit-based team. Each of the work groups mapped the process in its own way, but several steps stood out, including collecting patient satisfaction data, building a common understanding of the UBT’s work, and ensuring  active, joint sponsorship of the team. 

Mapping the process on the wall “helps people see their work visually, see where things fit in and where the gaps are,” said workshop participant Mariah Rouse, a labor liaison and member of UFCW Local 555 in the Northwest. “It’s a good way to get everyone’s input.”