Proactive Change
Carroll recommends the following approach:
Identify the desired outcomes. This requires posing questions like: What can a software upgrade or a new piece of information technology do for the lab's operations?
Increase productivity? Improve quality of care? Expand the lab's range of services? Create more accurate records or bills? Reduce costs?
Carroll suggests identifying four or five specific, measurable goals, and analyzing how the new technology will advance the lab toward those goals. For example, Carroll worked on an IT integration project that took information from multiple systems to create a complete episode-of-care record, providing a clear improvement in the quality of information available to clinicians. “Normally in upgrades there are all kinds of choices you need to make," he says. “Every choice should go back to the five things you need to impact."
Set expectations and accountability. “People always want to gravitate to what they're comfortable with, and you have to help individuals overcome the pull of the past," Carroll says. To that end, the staff must understand how a technology change can help achieve the outcomes mentioned above, and how they must adapt their workflows to reap the promised benefits. If they have participated in setting the goals, they will be more open to using the technology for its intended purpose, rather than working around it to keep doing things the way they always have. And if they are accountable for achieving specific productivity or quality improvements or cost reductions, they can more easily see the results of their extra effort.