The Situation:
The national leadership of a multi-regional organization wanted to assess the execution capabilities of one region. An internal leader from a high performing region was leveraged to provide the specific clinical recommendations and obtain input regarding other execution challenges.
Elements of the Approach:
Given that the organization was in a cost cutting, turn-around position, improvements from this assessment were mostly quantitative and related to clinical processes. A specific action plan for execution was created around each of the recommendations from this assessment. Amy partnered with the co-presidents and other leaders to subsequently develop priorities and a plan for execution around each of the assessment’s recommendations.
Business Impact:
The importance of this case study is not to necessarily focus on the short term business improvements from the assessment, but to focus on the assessment items that are considered foundational to execution excellence but were missing. The foundational items listed below can often take years to build or rebuild.
The execution challenges identified in the assessment, but could NOT be fully mitigated in the short term, included:
- Improving leadership partnering — (partnerships are built or erode slowly over time).
- Prioritizing initiatives — (every initiative was critical at this point in the turn-around).
- Managing organizational fatigue — (motivation and attitudes were challenged after years of cost-cutting).
- Adding critical resources to strategic initiatives — (resources were reduced annually over many years so staffing was very lean and investment dollars were not readily available).
- Improving the culture of the organization — (culture is often driven by leadership example).
Within three years, the regional organization was merged into another health system but the lesson about paying attention to the longer term foundational elements needed for improved execution is what is important.