Continuous Improvement Strategies

Chapter FiveIn the Trenches: Departmental-Level Strategies for Creating and Maintaining a Culture of Continuous Improvement

5.1 A Brief Introduction

In the last chapter, I highlighted some strategies that healthcare leaders can use to help them promulgate company-wide cultures that support continuous improvement (CI) initiatives. However, in my opinion, a healthcare firm will rarely be able to succeed in integrating CI into its corporate routines unless the institution has the support of its frontline supervisors and their staffs. The corporation’s executives can come up with excellent ideas for getting employees to buy into Six Sigma, Lean, and other CI methods. However, their plans will go astray if the organization’s administrators fail ...