Coming from the Transportation, Distribution, and Logistics industries to healthcare I was confident that fixing healthcare would just be another challenging re-engineering project. I was right about it being a re-engineering project, but I did underestimate the scope. The interdepartmental relationships and operational impacts of decision making are the most complicated that I have ever seen.
Now that I've been around healthcare for two years, I've learned that although it is complicated, one can apply standardized re-engineering tools to the problems. For those tools to be successful, they must be utilized by skilled and experienced practitioners who take the time to understand the voice of the customer at the operational level.
There is also a culture issue that is deeper than I've seen in other industries. It makes sense. People that have devoted their lives to healthcare are focused more on making people feel better than on the big picture of growing the business, reducing cost, improving service, and developing staff. Changing the culture will only come through demonstration that the difficult path to change is rewarding and beneficial in the end.
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