You're overseeing a healthcare project. How do you guarantee successful outcomes every time?

SMART goals are always needed but connecting to why for the stakeholders and involving those who do the work is the key to success and sustainability! Remember to always celebrate success!

1. Specific: Goals should clearly define the "who" and "what" of the project e.g. instead of "improve patient care," specify "increase patient satisfaction scores by 20%." 2. Measurable: Establish criteria to measure progress e.g. readmission rates or patient feedback scores. 3. Achievable: Goals should be realistic and attainable given available resources e.g. setting a goal to implement a new electronic health record system within six months is feasible if adequate training and support are provided. 4. Relevant: Ensure that the goals align with the broader mission of the healthcare organization. 5. Time-bound: Set deadlines for achieving goals to create accountability e.g. aim to complete staff training on new tools within 3 months.

Understanding what goals the leaders has and what is getting in their way of meeting these goals. Let's use care coordination to reducing readmissions. There are many stakeholders in solving this complex problem and there is huge value in bringing a cross functional team together to continually focus on the problems and the goal. A stakeholder relationship is often envisioned as a periodical interaction with status updates. The most productive relationship is to foster an ongoing backlog of hypotheses on small changes that can improve care coordination and reduce readmissions. This enables continuous value delivery and continuous improvement while keeping our eyes on the business value that is being delivered by the team.

In my experience, defining goals is key to making changes improvements, and ultimately transformation and healthcare. They provide inspiration to organizations and individuals, alike. A well-defined goal provides the guard rails and the finish line for all those involved in a project. I use SMART goals for individuals each year to help them know what to focus on and strive to stretch themselves, as well as for larger organizational initiatives to guide teams toward success.

1. Recognize all relevant stakeholders, including patients, providers, payers, and regulatory bodies. Conducting a thorough stakeholder analysis helps prioritize engagement efforts based on their influence and interest in the project. 2. Regular communication is essential for maintaining trust and cooperation throughout the project lifecycle. 3. Actively include stakeholders in the planning and implementation phases. 4. Create mechanisms for stakeholders to share their insights and concerns continuously. Regular feedback cycles can help refine project goals and strategies, ensuring alignment with stakeholder needs. 5. Create relationships with stakeholders by collaborating on initiatives that align with shared goals.

One stakeholder that is sometimes overlooked in initial set up of a project are the IT folks. Involving them from the beginning adds not only to their understanding of the project but their investment in making things work. And to boot healthcare staff can learn as the project progresses about technology issues and opportunities.

It has been my experience that many healthcare leaders approach complex problems by attempting to find a marketplace solution, managing the implementation in a traditional waterfall methodology and often spend a tremendous amount of time, money and goodwill. Ultimately the solution does not solve the problem. With the speed of change and innovation it's important to keep your eye on the complex problem you are trying to solve. Taking small parts of the problem and make a hypothesis on a proposed solution, develop a minimum viable solution, test the solution for your hypothesis, learn and improve. This allows for continuous delivery of value on solving pieces of the complex problem. This accommodates for a changing landscape as you go.

In my experience, digital apps with gamification features can play a vital role in boosting patient engagement and adherence, ultimately improving treatment processes and outcomes. By incorporating elements like progress tracking, rewards, challenges these apps turn what could be a daunting health regimen into something more interactive and motivating for patients. Apps that reward patients for taking their medication on time or completing physical therapy exercises can help foster consistency in their care routine. Engaging patients through these digital tools creates a sense of ownership and accomplishment, which not only keeps them committed to their treatment but improves their overall health outcomes by promoting long-term adherence.

What I’ve learned over the years, is the necessary element to define your patience and their families as a key stakeholder. In healthcare, with all its complexities, it’s really easy to get focused on what we want. But ultimately, if we communicate with our patients, listen to their needs, and design our systems for them, we know we’re focused on the right work. Then, as we go through changes or transformation within healthcare, making sure you use a 360° lens when defining stakeholders. I have learned, sometimes we forget about those who are downstream customers of a process. I have also learned, when this is done well, there is less resistance to making improvements, and success is more likely to be sustained.

Often the best way to mitigate risks is by making small bets vs one big bet. If you focus on breaking down the complex problems and small experiments for improvement the risk is minimized. One thing that becomes very important in a model like this is to consider your backlog through a lens of prioritization that considers the cost of delay/risk of not solving the problem. This requires the business experts to understand the problem enough to know the business value in the solution and the waste if the problem remains unsolved.

I learned the importance of this through my studies of the Toyota production system. And studying Shingo, I know, understand the importance of in process quality checks. With this new way of thinking, I have witnessed more successful process improvements that have led to fewer safety errors or quality concerns. Making sure we build quality throughout the entire healthcare process, and creating an environment where everybody recognizes they must be a quality inspector, has helped my teams in improving their own work.