Awareness - The Hospital Game

To encourage all staff members to question the way the Hospital runs, we designed a giant board game for 6 - 11 players. The aim of the game is to improve the total value of the hospital by deciding how many tokens to move around the board. We first played it with the Heads of Department, and then worked steadily through the whole hospital; it is now a key session within all new starters’ induction. The game allows a mixture of staff from different departments and managerial levels to understand what makes the hospital tick and to see clearly their contribution within the wider organisation.

Action - The Action Teams

To build on the wider understanding created by the game, we formed Action Teams to learn how to deal with those persistent issues that get in the way of the smooth running of the hospital.
One team focused on getting more immediate feedback from patients by introducing a system of “traffic light” cards - green for great patient service, yellow for warning signs and red for something that just is not right. These are available to all patients throughout the hospital.
Another team look at how the outpatients billing and accounts could be improved, and decreased the outstanding Unbilled Accounts by 87% over two months (see graph below).

Investing in Leadership

To support the new teams and to strengthen the existing departments, we have put 63 of the hospital leaders - managers, sisters, deputies and senior staff from all departments - through a 3-day leadership course. The investment of 189 man-training days, over a six-month period, has resulted in a consistency of approach and a common language among the hospital leaders. This has further been re-inforced with a series of coaching skills workshops, designed to help us increase our capacity for self-development.

Responsibility - the Process Teams

With greater awareness of the hospital’s strategic direction, a consistent leadership approach and trouble-shooting skills honed in the action teams, we’ve been able to start to address those issues that are complex, cross-functional areas that have a real impact on both the patient journey and staff morale and motivation.

Process Teams, groups drawn from across all departments, are deciding how to measure our performance in Patient Satisfaction, Staff Induction & Orientation and Inpatient admissions and discharges. We can then plan for and assess the effectiveness of the changes we are implementing in these areas.

In admissions alone, we have reduced the average time it takes to get a patient into their room by 8 minutes (see graph below) - a concerted effort by the front of house, admissions office, porters, ward clerks, nursing and housekeeping staff.