Physician engagement must-dos

by Jonathan H. Burroughs After covering how not to engage physicians, it is time to build a successful foundation for physician engagement and alignment. The first truism is that cultural alignment precedes economic alignment precedes clinical alignment. To put this into plain English, you first want to determine with whom to have a relationship before you determine what type of contract to create and before you can work together to optimize quality and minimize costs. Sadly, this order is often reversed, which is why so many engagement and alignment efforts fail. If you attempt to work on quality efforts with an independent practitioner who has no interest in working with your organization and who has no vested economic interest in the outcome, most of your efforts will be in vain. 1. Pursue a potential working relationship Most governing boards would never hire a CEO without significant due diligence through the creation of a job description, eligibility criteria, success factors, screening process, comprehensive interviews and evaluation process. Interestingly, most physicians are recruited with minimal due diligence (e.g., are they competent and do they have any skeletons in their past?) despite wide variation in what a physician brings in terms of personal/professional values, attitude, drive, motivation and world view. A community-based organization with a strong culture of service that recruits a general surgeon who is entrepreneurial, does not wish to take ...
Source: hospital impact - Category: Health Managers Authors: Source Type: blogs