The Studer Group identifies Rounding for Outcomes as “the consistent practice of asking specific questions of key stakeholders—leaders, employees, physicians and patients—to obtain actionable information.” The feedback provided during “Rounding” develops a closer personal relationship between staff members, and can greatly impact our industry’s overwhelming employee turnover rate, which the NIH notes as a serious concern.
At its core, Rounding has four goals, as follows:
- Connect on a human level
- Discover what is going well
- Discover who I should thank for a job well done
- Discover what tools and supplies are needed to perform well
My 90 Day Rounding Experiment
When I first became an Administrator at UnityPoint Health in Cedar Rapids, Rounding was not the norm. Typically administrators will Round with their Department Heads, and then the Rounding trickles down within the departments. Being new to the organization, I decided to Round with all Team Members in my first 90 days.
The Results were Remarkable
After my self-imposed 90-day challenge, I felt like I had earned a PhD in understanding where and how my team needed support. I discovered that communication was the key to more complete and enjoyable employee engagement. This discovery had significant implications for the quality of our work, and ultimately profitability. But the overarching question remained. How do I leverage communication for better employee engagement?
Skilled Day
Staff and patient scheduling emerged as the crux of our communication frustrations. I then reached out to a technology company to brainstorm how to fix our communication problem. As a result of my Rounding results, we developed Skilled Day, a web app that allows simple staff scheduling and family communication. We rolled out Skilled Day in November, 2019, only to have my assessment of our problems validated. For example, we discovered that there was a:
- increase in positive response for “Information about patient schedules are communicated efficiently and effectively” for support staff
- increase in positive response for “I know when my patient has therapy and other scheduled services” for ALL staff
Multiple other facets of our services improved as a result, including Patient Experieince, Weekly Bedside Care Conferences, and Communication as a New Standard of Care. To find out more, watch the video below, and then schedule a demo with Skilled Day!
Jaclyn Hall is a Co-Founder of Skilled Day and the Administrator at UnityPoint Health, St. Luke’s Hospital, in Cedar Rapids Iowa, where she has worked the past 7 years. She has a Doctor of Physical Therapy from the University of Iowa, where she also received her Master of Business Administration and Bachelor of Science. Jaclyn is a Certified Professional of Healthcare Quality through the National Association for Healthcare Quality.