The employed physician engagement index

We need a qualitative and quantitative measure of employed physician engagement. Engagement, in this instance, describes how much the values of employed physicians are aligned with the values of their employers and how much discretionary effort they are willing to contribute and the value they are willing to create.

Here are some reasons why we should measure a longitudinal engagement index:

1. It would help graduating residents make better career decisions
2. It would help patients since disengaged doctors make more mistakes
3. It would reduce employed physician turnover
4. It would indentify engagement best practices
5. It would reduce the costs of replacing drop out docs
6. It would help identify how we should segment employed physicians (academic v public v private? Demographics? Psychographics?)
7. It would create data driven workforce development policy decisions
8. It would help add value driven care
9. It would reduce physician burnout
10. It would help staffing firms deliver a better result

I suspect that there are many ways to engage employed physicians and one technique will not apply to all.

Here are some ways to engage employed doctors:

1. Create a culture of trust and caring, not rules

2. Give doers the tools they need to improve

3. Coach them daily

4. Give doers the internal and external incentives they need to improve

5. Recognize that it's not all about you

6. Use expectancy theory to reward i.e. a proximate relationship between success and reward shortly afterwards with something the doctor values

7. Stress self-performance and measurement against a standard

8. Be fair

9. Be transparent

10. Fix the system that creates errors, not people.

11. Put us both out of our misery and help me find another place to work?

12. Clarify expectations. Do you want me to innovate or not?

13. Lead by example

14. Stop wasting time on the 77% who are disengaged. Focus on the 13% instead

15. Create a product I can believe in instead of sell and deliver using dysfunctional systems.

16. Stop subjecting them to needless administrivia and IT mandates

17. Create care teams so everyone can practice at the top their license and add maximum value.

18. Recruit for innovation

19. Focus on user/customer/patient/payer defined value instead of engaging in turf wars with advance practice professionals

20.?Practice Othercare

There are many research questions:

1. Why are some engaged and others not?
2. What are the determinants of successful physician engagement strategies?
3. Are physician engagement strategies the same as strategies in other industries?
4. Are engagement trends changing and why?
5. What is the cost of disengagement?
6. What is the ROI of successful engagement interventions?
7. What are the differences between employed physician engagement levels of those that work in private, public or academic settings?
8. Do intrapreneurship and innovation initiatives increase employed physician engagement?
9. How and how much does engagement reduce turnover rates?
10. Who should be responsible for leading physician engagement interventions and what are the models for doing so?

Keeping track of the number or percentage of employed physician numbers is not enough. We need to understand both the quantity and quality of factors driving physician engagement to improve care. The patient's experience starts with the doctor's experience. You get what you measure.

Arlen Meyers, MD, MBA is the President and CEO of the Society of Physician Entrepreneurs on Substack