Written By: Angela Fieler, MPA, CMQ/OE, Senior Consultant

If you read this newsletter regularly, you no doubt know that the Baird Group works tirelessly with organizations in not just defining a culture of service excellence, but in taking definitive steps to achieve that culture.  We often write about leadership responsibilities and the challenges that many leaders face, making suggestions on how readers might overcome, or help others overcome, those challenges.

Changing the culture in a healthcare organization that often functions in a volatile, uncertain, complex, and ambiguous environment can be daunting.  In many organizations, the cultures that exist today have been fostered and supported, often unintentionally, for years.  People who work in these organizations may be tired of “the way things have always been done” or frustrated that nothing ever changes.  Complaints and negativity often become the order of the day.  Ending this downward spiral may seem impossible.

Last week, I overheard someone say, “We need to flood our communication channels with good news!”  How simple, yet profound.  The next time you hear someone complain, what good news can you share?  If nothing comes to mind, go out and find something good happening in your organization.  Spread the word far and wide.  A wiser person than I once told me, “Good things are happening in your organization every day.  Your job is to go out and find those things and tell others about them.” 

In the Baird Model, we emphasize the need for a strategic communication plan and a communication team to support your cultural transformation work.  If you are engaged in changing your culture and don’t have one or the other, contact Baird Group to find out how we might help.  If you have a communication plan and a team to support that plan, ask yourself how you can be sure to fill those communication channels with good news.