A clear definition of effective management is helping Cleveland-based University Hospitals drive performance improvement across its 21 hospitals, according to the system’s chief quality and clinical transformation officer.
Peter Pronovost, MD, PhD, pointed to research by Stanford University economist Nick Bloom, PhD, whose research has shown that strong management and accountability are often missing in the hospital industry.
At University Hospitals, management is defined with a plain metric.
“We have a really simple rule: You have a management system if you can show a run chart that has a slope other than zero for a measure that matters,” Dr. Pronovost said. “If you don’t have that, you don’t have a management system, right?
“So often you’ll hear, ‘Well, what are you doing?’ ‘Well, I’m working on this, or I have these 10 meetings,'” he said. “Hey, that’s great. I don’t really care. You got to do those things. Where’s your run chart?”
Accountability stems from that chart when performance is stratified by hospital, clinic, unit and employee. With that data, Dr. Pronovost said effective managers recognize top performers and work to engage those who are struggling.
Transformation does not need to be complicated, he said: “Those two pieces together — have a run chart and look at who’s doing well … and support those who are not — it’s almost foolproof in moving needles at our health system.”
