As leaders, we know consistent communication is key to guiding and inspiring others to lead and better manage their respective areas.
This week, our hospital had its annual “Advance” (what most organizations call a retreat). The Advance provides a time to reflect on our annual performance and where we want to move into the future. It build strong camaraderie among the team, as well.
Years back, I shared that Dr. Peterson, one of our physicians, asked me how we were going to engage more of our medical staff. I told him that we would have a “retreat” to share our vision, goals and focus areas. He said, “Kashman, we’ve retreated long enough … it’s time to advance this organization.” So we called it the Advance, and this week marks our 6th annual Advance. Our theme is: Inspire Excellence: Inspiring Leaders, Inspired Team.
Many organizations have similar strategies and goals, but our goals center on service, safety and quality; clinical integration; financial performance; and workforce engagement. In an effort to keep a balance on managing our business and the health of our team (since they run our business every day), we crafted the following themes:
The three themes through our Advance and breakout sessions included:
- Focus on exceptional patient and family-centered care. This means focusing on nationally recognized, evidence-based practices.
- Focus on the financial viability of our business. This means focusing on variable costs, variation in care processes, purchased services and potential fixed costs.
- Focus on the health and well-being of our team. This means understanding potential lifestyle and related stressors (could be poor work processes, relationships, etc.), poor nutrition, lack of physical activity or lack of sleep.
Our team also showcases its work using “Houses” to tell their story. The houses show: goals; who is needed to collaborate on the goals; key tactics; and outcomes.
As Dr. Jon Hart, one of our other physicians, shared, every department has a house and across the hospital, we have created neighborhoods, towns and cities, reflective of the community we serve.
Our breakout sessions dug further into our patient experience efforts and the health of our team. We specifically look at what is working well for each of these and how leaders could better support patient experience efforts and a healthier work environment for our team. For each, we focused on the following questions:
Patient experience
- On which specific tactics are we doing well?
- What obstacles get in the way of consistent high performance?
Health and well-being
- How do we help ourselves and our team manage their health and stress?
- What are we doing well to support the health and well-being of our team?
I look forward to hearing what you and your leadership team do to help inspire our team.
Scott Kashman serves as the chief administrative officer of Cape Coral Hospital, part of Lee Health in southwest Florida.