By Rose O. Sherman, EdD, RN, FAAN
A young leader was recently telling me about a wonderful new recognition program that she initiated on her unit. She was sure that it would result in higher staff engagement. She is now three months down the road and realizes that nothing has changed. Staff seemed interested when she initially proposed it but now complain it involves too much additional work and there is not enough in it for them. Scenarios like this are not uncommon. Many new initiatives either fail or never achieve their intended outcomes. The late business guru Peter Drucker often said that “Culture eats strategy for breakfast.” He was right about this.
Key Reasons for Failure
1. Initiative Fatigue in the Organization – some organizations across time implement so many “new” initiatives that they are viewed as the flavor of the month. This is especially true in organizations, units or departments that have frequent changes in leadership.
2. Lack of Front-line Leadership Support – to successfully drive initiatives across the organization and to the front line of care, leaders must fully support the initiative.
3. Failure to Engage Staff in the Planning – well-designed initiatives not only include good structures and systems but also consider the knowledge, skills, and abilities of the staff who are expected to implement them at the front-line.
4. Poor Planning – many good initiatives fail because of a lack of detailed planning about how, where and when to initiate the change. Planning needs to carefully consider issues like whether to pilot in one area first, how to best communicate the change to staff, staff training and an evaluation mechanism.
5. Failure to Sustain the Initiative over Time – initiatives can start with great fanfare and planning but what is often not consider is how to change the organizational culture to sustain the initiative across time.
Strategies to Promote Success
1. Create a Sense of Urgency – to effectively implement a new initiative, staff in an organization need to understand why it is needed. You need the tell the compelling story of why change is needed.
2. Consider the Organizational Culture – successful initiatives from other organizations may not be directly transferable to an organization with a different culture. This needs to be carefully considered in the planning process.
3. Get Leadership Buy-In – leaders need to have the opportunity to discuss their concerns about initiatives. Once the decision is made to move forward, front-line leaders need to be directly asked to commit to the success of the initiative.
4. Involve Staff in Every Aspect of Planning – to create buy-in and develop a better plan, staff need to be involved in the planning process. Select front-line staff champions that can help in the roll-out, training and evaluation process.
5. Don’t Make Assumptions about Training Needs – carefully plan how, when and where to educate staff about the initiative. A lecture may not be the right strategy when the initiative calls for new skills that need to be practiced and observed.
6. Plan an Ongoing Evaluation – to be successful, initiatives need to become part of the culture. They need to become part of the organizational dashboard evaluation and remain a priority after the initial launch.
Leadership Considerations
In today’s often chaotic and complex health care environments, staff can easily develop initiative fatigue. Chuck and Dan Heath in their book Made to Stick point out qualities that make ideas or initiatives really stick. From their research, initiatives need to be simple, concrete, credible and resonate with our value system. It could be that this new leader had a good plan for recognition but the process for the application was a little too complicated and time-consuming. Successful leaders are good planners who understand that the building blocks need to be in place for initiatives to succeed.
Read to Lead
Heath, C. & Heath, D. (2007). Made to Stick. Random House Publishers.
Read Rose Sherman’s new book available now – The Nurse Leader Coach: Become the Boss No One Wants to Leave
© emergingrnleader.com 2019
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