Rounding gives you valuable insight into your department’s inner workings and operations. It also gives you visibility as a leader with your front-line staff. There are three main areas that are the focal point for rounding covered below: employee engagement, process improvements from obversions of poor processes and techniques, and internal promotion of high performing team members.
Employee engagement is the center of attention for hospital support services. An engagement and integrated team are integral for overall success. There are real data points and statistics that were discussed previously in the article for Support Service Employee Engagement. One of the easiest ways to improve employee engagement for your front-line team members it to engage with them as often as possible. Not the simple “good mornings” in a hallway passing, but a personal conversation can go a long-ways in ensuring your team feels like a component of your overall structure.
In healthcare lean six sigma there is a principle titled “Going to the Gemba”. The phrase means simply going to the source for data or another way to put this is to “ride” along with team members to better understand day to day operations and processes. Data can only go so far. Actually, putting the techniques and processes into play yourself gives you valuable insight into poorly designed processes. In my departments, we implemented a ride along day coined, “Manage by Walking Around”. All of our Support Service leadership spends a day a month working alongside a front-line team member completing their work. At the end of the day, we join together to discuss the processes we can implement to improve the operations for the teams as well as the overall results of the department. This is a powerful tool that has uncovered countless deficiencies and simple ways to improve our operations.
As a Support Service leader, we spent the majority of our time in Human Resources employee relations efforts to improve poor performing individuals. With all of this focus on poor performing, we rarely have the time to dedicate to showcasing our top performing employees. Rounding gives leadership an ability to see these team members in action and to reward them. This would not be possible by looking at data alone. Reviewing turn over times in the Environmental Department shows you how quickly certain team members can complete a task. However, you never receive the full picture. One of the key drivers to a higher HCAHP score is friendliness of the housekeeper. You have the ability to see your top performers completing this task better with rounding, where you are in the units and see them in action.