QI Council revamp

Fri, 06/24/2016 - 16:21 -- eturturici

We have a QI council that has been on hiatus for quite some time due to a large staff transition. We would like to revamp the QI council this fall. How do you recommend we reset and refresh the council, without completely reinventing the wheel? Any suggestions are appreciated as I am brand new to this role, thank you!

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Submitted by tkane on

Great question ..

One suggestion is to revamp your QI council using a QI approach. This would create an opportunity for your agency to explore:

1) The current state of your Council

2) The preferred "future state" of the Council 

3) Next steps that can be implemented to begin moving toward that desired future state

Ty Kane

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Submitted by gkroberts on

Hi, there is some great discussion regarding this exact topic in the following community forum threads that would be useful for you:

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Gurleen Roberts, MPH
Director of Quality Management
Cobb & Douglas Public Health
Marietta, GA
gurleen.roberts@dph.ga.gov

Submitted by Kdyer on

Our Council is made up of non-supervisory staff. When we first began we asked supervisors to suggest an employee from their program to serve on the Council, from that point on it has been a voluntary process and we have not had any problems in getting employees to serve. We are beginning our 4th year and have had only one person drop off the Council because they were not a good fit. Participation is reviewed with the QI Coordinator and the Council member on an annual basis. Once your membership is in place I would begin by developing/reviewing a new QI Plan complete with goals and objectives.

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Submitted by Torney Smith on

This is a great opportunity as you have had some historical agency experience. I would follow tha advice above to use a QI approach. Examine the customer need, evaluate past successes and areas for improvement, engage the stakehjolders in the process.and continue to post your successes on this site and seek input as needed. If you need a QI Council plan there are many willing to share what is being used elsewhere as a guide.

 

Best of luck and keep us informed.

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Submitted by tlsmith on

The one thing I would add is to spend some time focusing on training if your new Council members do not have much experience. Last year, we had a small nucleus of experienced Council members and but over half our members were new to QI. Additionally, we were switching from a Plan Do Check Act (PDCA) model to Lean Six Sigma (LSS), so we were all new to that.

Everyone on the Council went through a Lean Six Sigma training -- two 4-hour sessions with a LSS Black Belt we brought in from another LHJ--before we really dove into the work of reshaping the Council. Without that, I think the new members would have felt too unknowledgeable to even be able to say what a future state should be.

Once everyone sort of had their feet under them, we did a brainstorm and affinity diagram of what a Culture of Quality should look like at KPHD and then built our annual Council work plan around SMART objectives in each of the areas we came up with.

The Quality Council next did a mini QI Project to improve the process by which staff members submit process improvement ideas to us. This gave us both an improved process and provided valuable experience and practice for the new council members. We launched our new process in April, and we now have a couple of projects going or gearing up and we are about to revise our Council Charter to reflect the modifications in how we will operate.

But we haven’t forgotten about training. Through the course of this year, Council members will all be completing either Green Belt or Yellow Belt training. Finally, we have incorporated training/practice into our Council meetings, as time permits. So when a new project is about to start, we might spend 20 or 30 minutes discussing what QI tools could be used or some of the thought processes the QI Facilitator for the project might go through.

 

Terri Smith
Quality Council Chair
Kitsap Public Health District
terri.smith@kitsappublichealth.org

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