The last time I took a Ropes Course, I was a junior in high school and attended along with other members of one of our school clubs. The purpose, of course, was to bring us closer together, to trust one another and to help us emotionally connect, with each other and the mission of the club.
Having not been exposed to a Ropes Course since then, I wasn’t sure if such courses were still in vogue, but apparently there are — at least they are at Kaiser Permanente. At the Human Capital Investment Conference in Chicago on Nov. 19, Benjamin Chu, MD, president of the Southern California Region for Kaiser Permanente, discussed his system’s “Leadership 400” initiative and its efforts to better align system leadership.
Healthcare is an industry long known for operating in silos, and Kaiser believed that it needed to break through those silos to maintain its success in a future that will reward coordinated, value- and vision-driven care.
But breaking down silos is easier said than done. Kaiser’s approach was to focus on system and health plan leadership, working to improve alignment and collaboration among this group first. From there, the leaders would be charged with cascading these principles to others in the organization.
Kaiser saw aligned and collaborative leadership as the “pathway toward and interdependent culture,” said Dr. Chu.
“You can have the most beautiful strategic plan, but it’s about the boots on the ground.” That is to say, a strong and forward-thinking plan is important, but it can’t really impact an organization unless its employees carry it out.
Leadership 400, which started as Leadership 300, but quickly grew, consists of 20 groups, each led by a senior leader. Members from the same department are spread throughout the groups, so that each group includes leaders from different facilities and different departments within the organization.
The groups met throughout the course of a year to share experiences, work to align their goals and build a common vocabulary around leadership and goals. They also participated in experiential learning experiences to help build trust — and encourage vulnerability, said Dr. Chu. Enter ropes courses and horses! 
The ropes and horse courses did both those things, and helped improve leaders’ communication. If you’re not familiar, ropes courses lead participants through a variety of trust-building exercises, most of which involve heights, ropes, harnesses — and reliance on other team members to achieve the goal of each exercise. In team building that involves horses, a common exercise is giving leaders a harness and asking them to figure out how to put it on the horse, and get them moving. “They will follow leaders if you’re clear, if they trust you,” Dr. Chu said.
The idea that ropes courses and horses are the key to building leadership alignment, and thereby organizational success, seems, on the surface, a little touchy-feely to me. But, the continued success of Kaiser — and its continual successes around market share, cost and quality (which pretty much blows competitors out of the water) — should make every health system in the country take a second look at these less-than-conventional methods for building alignment.
According to Dr. Chu, the leadership groups and team-building exercises have required a minimal financial and time commitment, but have reaped great rewards: better collaboration, better alignment and greater innovation.
“Once the leadership group is aligned, they’re focused and they have the same energy…it’s amazing what will happen,” he said.
