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The Benchmark Email
...benchmarks, strategies and ideas for improving
your agency
A service of Fazzi Associates, Inc.
June 19, 2006
How To Implement Successful Change Projects
Question:
It seems that every time we initiate a major change
effort – quality improvement, strategic planning,
employee retention, customer service, paperwork reduction
– it starts with great fanfare but slowly fizzles
and grinds to a halt or a mediocre finish. Why does
this happen and is there anything that can be done
to increase the likelihood that the effort will succeed?
Answer:
The good news is you're not alone. The bad news is
that failure in change efforts is something that plagues
most agencies.
There
is no shortage of books on how to successfully implement change efforts.
Amazon presently lists 55,371 titles on "change". No doubt many of
these books can provide you with helpful hints, but to save you time
we offer some insights from a doctoral study by David Moody at Northcentral
University on how to implement cultural change in health systems.
Moody
focused on successful cultural changes related to improving patient
satisfaction in six hospitals. These were hospitals whose efforts
lead to significant improvement in patient satisfaction scores. The
hospitals ranged in size from 59 beds to 583 beds. Sixty-seven percent
of these hospitals' leaders reported beginning their initiative because
of low patient satisfaction scores. While the study included many
insights, one of the major findings related to what the participants
in these change efforts felt was essential to their successful change.
Six imperatives were identified.
If
you asked to list imperatives for someone setting out to change a
culture, what advice would you give?
|
Response
|
Percent
of Respondents |
| Buy-in
and commitment, especially leadership |
67% |
| Empowerment |
32% |
| Readiness
planning |
24% |
| Communicate
the initiative continually |
22% |
| Measurement |
17% |
| Accountability |
15% |
What
is clear is that the number one finding for successful change efforts
is the buy-in and commitment of leadership. If you have it and if
the leader maintains a commitment to the change effort, there is a
better chance that the effort will work. Without it, you might be
wasting your time.
This
was not a surprise to Bob Agoglia, a Partner at Fazzi Associates who
provides Strategic Planning consultation. "Having assisted leaders
in hundreds of strategic planning efforts with agencies throughout
the country, I can predict the success of each plan based on the buy-in
and commitment of the agency's leadership", says Agoglia. "There is
a direct correlation between successful strategic plans and strong,
committed leaders. If leadership is committed, it is highly likely
that the plan will be a major success. If the leader is weak or not
committed, it will be a long year with little or no results."
To
avoid these problems, Fazzi interviews the leadership to ensure that
they thoroughly understand what is entailed in the strategic planning
effort and, just as important, what is entailed in the implementation
of the plan. "This has clearly led to not only stronger plans", says
Agoglia, "it also leads to an implementation process that is timely
and highly effective." And as Moody's study pointed out, it is
the leadership that makes it happen.
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