© OutreachU, ltd.
ISSUE 9
Your Outreach Operating System: CHAOS or STRUCTURE
HOW DO HIGHLY DYSFUNCTIONAL HEALTHCARE ORGANIZATIONS SURVIVE & PROSPER
Have you ever worked in or worked with a highly dysfunctional organization? Have you ever wondered, “How does this place continue to survive and prosper? It’s almost always chaos. There are minimal to no systems in place. Everything is a “one off.” Uniform processes, protocols and overall structure are nearly completely lacking. Yet, somehow, payroll is met, a critical mass of customers remains loyal, and the bills get paid. A mystery to me?”
But who are you? You are likely a highly committed, talented, adaptable, responsible, reliable employee, possessing a super critical trait, an ownership mindset. You take pride in your workplace, and you think and operate as if you were an owner. Despite lacking systems, processes, and nearly full-time chaos – you muster it up and do all you can all the time to keep the complex machine humming, keep customers loyal and you devote energies to maintain cohesion among staff. Many staff members do not share your ownership mindset.
With more than 60 years of self-employment and working in and with hundreds of organizations/companies with a wide range of dysfunction, I believe the reason that highly dysfunctional organizations survive and prosper, above all, is because each of these is staffed with a critical mass of employees that maintain an ownership mindset. They do whatever has to be done, reflexively and intuitively, to keep the place functional no matter what levels of uncertainty and disorder exist. They genuinely care as if they were an owner. Can you relate to this?
HOW TO PROGRESS IN A BETTER WAY
The downside to highly dysfunctional healthcare organizations/companies is, first, they all too often exhaust those who are keeping it functioning because their behaviors and actions are ownership-based. But the hard fact is they are NOT OWNERS. Then, over time, they break down or defect for all the right reasons. Sometimes, these kinds of chaos-factories implode. However, what is most mystifying of all is how they can maintain enough dedicated employees to continue.
But is this any way to operate? If you own or are in a healthcare entity with Outreach functions, do you want this to be chaotic, uncertain, unstructured or unsystematized? How can you progress in a better way?
FIRST THINGS FIRST
Identify, support, and celebrate those you know have an ownership mindset. Despite lack of process, protocols, structure, and systems, keep the organism of the organization as healthy as possible with these devoted individuals. Then, methodically and carefully, begin to engineer an Outreach Operating System. Your top Outreach staff will keep the engine humming, but to increase your likelihood of retaining and developing each one, engineer for them to support Outreach architecture.
OUTREACH PRIMARY ASSESSMENT: THE TEN ESSENTIAL ELEMENTS
All healthcare clinicians know what a PRIMARY ASSESSMENT is for patients. Our firm begins almost all our engagements by conducting an OUTREACH PRIMARY ASSESSMENT of the organization. We immerse ourselves in discovering the status of the elements of TEN ESSENTIAL OUTREACH OPERATING SYSTEMS ARCHITECTURE.
To increase your certainty of retaining and developing your Outreach Operators that already possess an ownership mindset, you must set them up for success by first stabilizing, fortifying, and improving the elements you have in place. Then, if any are missing, begin to engineer in these.
WHERE ARE WE HEADED FROM HERE
In THE BOOK OF OUTREACH FOR HEALTHCARE: How to Grow Revenue by Astonishing the Right Customers Consistently, detail is provided about the ten essential elements of an Outreach Operating System. The basics of these will be forthcoming for the next OutreachBEAT articles.
In the meantime, do all you can to increase certainty. Identify those in your orbit that possess an ownership mindset and do all you can to support, inspire, and develop them. They will keep your machine humming and your chaos at bay only for so long. Set them up for success.
BE IN TOUCH
I’d appreciate and enjoy your thoughts about how dysfunctional healthcare entities survive and prosper, especially regarding their Outreach. And, I’d also enjoy your views on an ownership mindset as an employee and as one who employs.
To learn more about the book, the online course, and the Healthcare Outreach Practitioner LEVEL I Credential go to thinkthroughtools.com or email [email protected].
© OutreachU, ltd. PRESS, ThinkThroughTools, LLC, all rights reserved
Richard M. Obertots, MBA, NREMT-P (ret.) is CEO/Drummer of ThinkThroughTools, LLC. & OutreachU, ltd., based in Canfield, Ohio, USA. He has 45 + years’ experience in EMS, air medical transport and critical care healthcare. He began as a Nationally Registered Paramedic, then Hospital EMS/Trauma Coordinator and Financial Analyst. Rich has instructed full-time at the University level and been a non-stop business creator and owner for more than five decades. He and his companies have operated in nearly every state of the USA, and he’s had numerous healthcare business endeavors throughout Australia and Canada. All of these involved designing and implementing healthcare Outreach Operating Systems, methods and supporting software.
He is the author of THE BOOK OF OUTREACH for HEALTHCARE; How to Grow Revenue by Astonishing the Right Customers Consistently, the newest edition scheduled for limited release later in 2025. He can be reached at [email protected] 330.623.5910.
