07/15/2021
A great customer experience, or patient and family experience in healthcare, is something everybody says they want, but we often fail to think about it as something other than downstream. In other words, from a senior leader’s perspective, it can feel many degrees removed from their purview or is therefore someone else's problem. The truth is that patient and family experience is inextricably linked to employee, or often specifically, care team experience, system strategy, and their role or purpose within that. Sure, better technology and well-designed buildings can help, but the reality is that, especially in health care, interactions with the care team matter the most.
So, for senior leaders, the most surefire way to solidify patient and family experience is to invest your time and energy in the care team and administrators charged with making it happen regardless of direct reporting relationships – the hierarchy can still exist, but we live in a highly networked, interdependent world now. Be present without micromanaging, show interest and curiosity with follow through on helping them with what they need, and elevate their voices to a level commensurate with being part of a strategic asset. In other words, talk to and listen to them directly – they’ll feel valued upstream, and you’ll get helpful information about how to support them in your collective pursuit of success downstream.
Further, I happened to come across this on point quote from Susan McPherson, communications consultant, and author of the book, “The Lost Art of Connecting” on the HBR IdeaCast podcast this week:
“For the C-Suite...I think it’s vitally important that they don’t relegate building meaningful connections to the annual sales conference or the monthly happy hours because studies show that when employees are more deeply connected, their productivity goes up, they are more likely to stay at the company longer, and they are more likely to share with the people that they know how great it is to work there. So, to me, if you are a leader of a company, make time for this at the beginning of every meeting. Get away from the weather talk. But, also, you can’t expect people to ‘bring their full selves’ to work if you’re not going to do that yourself and create safe spaces because we know that many people don’t feel safe and for good reason.”
So, what are you waiting for? Start talking directly to the people most responsible for making a difference in your customers’ touch points with your organization!
- Joel Worthington
