(4/14/2017)

At many healthcare facilities, associate engagement is an untapped means of enhancing revenue, and one already available to you.
 
An associate who feels valued will always do more than required, consider what’s best for the organization as they make decisions, and stick around for the long run. 

As it happens, high associate engagement has well-documented impact on high profits:
  • Organizations with highly engaged associates outperform low-engagement organizations financially by 202%. (Gallup)
  • Organizations with highly engaged associates reap 233% greater customer loyalty and 26% greater annual revenue increase. (Aberdeen)
  • Engaged associates deliver 21% higher productivity, 22% higher profits, 25% lower turnover, 48% fewer safety incidents, and 37% lower absenteeism. (Gallup)
  • Lost productivity stemming from associate disengagement costs U.S. companies $450-$550 billion annually. (Gallup)

 

In facilities management, investing in associates also means you can reduce costs and multiply resources dramatically.

How so?

 
First, consider seven ways healthcare facilities unwittingly erode associate engagement, at great financial cost:
  • Cutting staff to save money, then paying twice as much to an external contractor to perform the same work.
  • Outsourcing something your associates can manage internally, or could manage with adequate training & tools.
  • Low interest or knowledge from hospital leadership regarding facilities needs and changing regulations, resulting in deferred maintenance and inadequate funding for projects with big, costly ramifications.
  • Bringing in a third-party consultant who insists on imposing a new culture, values and standards, versus meeting your associates where they are today.
  • Inconsistent feedback, disparate systems or processes that conflict more than they help one another.
  • Basing decisions on personal preferences or biases, rather than data.
  • Failure to facilitate knowledge transfer or succession planning as your workforce ages.
 
We could go on, and possible solutions go beyond what we can cover in this article. But you can begin countering disengagement triggers by emulating three practices by high-ROI facilities management programs:
 
1. Reduce waste & overwhelm 
Disparate systems, processes and documentation are common symptoms of a decentralized facilities management program. We often see this in organizations where different entities manage different aspects of facilities management.
 
Not only are associates operating in different ways under different standards, but it’s also difficult to pinpoint performance metrics and records at a moment’s notice, which can be a huge problem during a regulatory audit.
 
As you can imagine, misaligned processes are a breeding ground for miscommunication, inefficiencies, and duplicate expenses. By contrast, standardizing facilities management systems not only makes everyone’s job easier, but also enables you to spot inefficiencies and waste far more easily—something associates and your bank account will both thank you for.
 
2. Build internal capabilities 
Imagine you got little to no resources to grow your professional skills, but your boss routinely paid two or three times your salary for an outsider to handle portions of your job. Doesn’t exactly make you feel valued, trusted or capable, does it?
 
Likewise, many healthcare facilities end up paying too much for work that could have been handled better and faster, in-house, by associates who are immediately available and familiar with the organization.
 
Want to cultivate a sense of pride and drive among associates? Invest in their professional development. Lucky for your bottom line, breaking free from external service contracts will also free up significant savings, year after year.
 
3. Make order fulfillment more visible 
You might provide outstanding service, but if no one knows you fixed something, who can appreciate it? From the customer’s perspective, if you’ve requested a repair but heard nothing since, you won’t be a happy camper—even if the repair was completed while you weren’t looking.
 
Our client facilities avoid that trap by utilizing an online service portal where internal customers can monitor service requests, receive real-time updates, and provide feedback. Besides enhancing the customer experience, the service portal also enables facilities to recognize and reward associates for high customer satisfaction.
 
 
 

We believe employees come to work seeking to do good each day. By eliminating faulty systems and factors that hold them back and breed poor decisions, you’ll increase associate successes, engagement and, you guessed it: their productivity and ROI.