The impact of nonverbals
Over the past few months I've taken note to how the c-suite presents themselves in meetings, particularly in public, patient-facing settings. It's absolutely incredible to experience this knowing the challenges we're going through ($100M shortfall this FY, $250M over next 2 years), yet to witness key leaders across the org present themselves in a confident and composed manner. More than anything, it's reiterated the importance of nonverbals. There are the more obvious cues of facial expressions and vocal tones, and the not-so-obvious such as posture, stature, breathing, body movements (fidgets/motions), head tilts, and eye contact. In passing the CEO and COO in the hall every other day or so, they are consistently alert, content, smiling, and well-groomed. Additionally, they not only acknowledge my presence but greet me and other colleagues (agnostic of position) majority of the time. And while this seems trivial, it sends a very strong message throughout the organization and publicly, to both employees and patients-- hey, we face challenges but we can do this, together. It reminds me a lot of a coach in a post-game news conference. The best coaches have a way of deflecting attention away from the hotspots and onto other focal points -- such as the giving younger players some game time, getting 3 players back from injury next week, or mastering new play schemes and being more "ready to launch" next week. Same thing with leaders in a major corporation, and I've definitely been learning a great deal on how to better my leadership skills and influence outcomes simply via my nonverbals.
Following the leader
In mid-June, I launched a new team huddle as part of a much broader multi-phase, incremental rollout
that will adapt certain features of a standardized anticipatory care
delivery model. The overarching goal is a paradigm shift from reactive to anticipatory care. And where a pilot leverages a "potentially shippable" product to test in the market/environment, we are using a proof of concept framework, which leverages a build/test-as-you-go methodology, similar to the agile methodology. It's been fascinating to see this initiative evolve over time, going from a basic huddle that aims to get everyone present and talking/listening to the present-day standard of actually mitigating patient risks. It's been 2 months since going live, and I've found quite a few best practices to be incorporated as part of our ongoing rollout. Most notably, I have identified 3 critical success factors: continuity, culture, and leadership. While this project is currently only used during the day shift on weekdays, it reiterates the need for consistency 24/7. I could implement the greatest model ever during the day, M-F, but if all other times fail to adapt, what have we accomplished? From a leadership standpoint (and related to the notes on nonverbals), a unit staff/team often turns to their manager/lead for initial reaction re: adoption. "Is this realistic? Should I do this? Why should I care? What do you think?" It's reiterated the criticality of not just having a manager agree to carry out the tasks/projects asked of them but to truly believe in and support an initiative and be willing to change him/herself. And as before, it reiterates the extreme importance of body language. And once a precedence has been set, the ride from there on out is much, MUCH easier. The third critical success factor that goes with the continuity and leadership is the culture. So let's say that my manager supports this model and everyone's all in all the time; this doesn't necessarily equate to improved outcomes. Why? 1 word -- goals. What are we trying to accomplish? The expectation set will gravitate towards awareness, yes, but what ultimately makes a team/staff improve outcomes is via goals. After inquiring about the unit goals 2 weeks ago, I found that current goals are to merely "get them out faster", turn and churn, not "keep them healthy". So i'm tweaking these as well. I find it amazing that a major unit at a level-1 trauma hospital does not have anticipatory, patient-first team goals anyways. The goals, instead, are how to shorten the length of stay and washing your hands more-- important but a drop in the bucket compared to actually improving patient outcomes. It totally misses the boat! The coming months will be very interesting to see this all play out.
