Change is necessary, particularly for organizations that want to innovate and adapt to technology. As technology advances rapidly, health care leaders need to adjust workflows to adapt to technological changes and best serve patients. Change management allows organizations to implement new tech while reducing communication and consistency challenges. Learn more about change management in health care IT and its importance.
What Is Change Management?
Change management refers to companies’ methods to bring about internal and external change. It allows for the seamless adoption of workflows while reducing disruption. Change management methods can take many forms, including:
- Employee preparation and support.
- Outlining the steps for change.
- Monitoring activities before and after the implementation to ensure success.
Multiple individuals are involved in change management, including C-suite executives and stakeholders. It’s also essential that those most impacted by the change, such as medical providers, are on board with the processes.
Why Is Change Management Important in Health Care?
Health care practices and organizations can better achieve their goals through change management. Adopting a change management model typically leads to little resistance from health care staff. With an effective change management plan in place, organizations will see reduced stress, confusion and anxiety. Change management can take several forms, including adaptive and transformational models.
An adaptive change management model typically focuses on making small, incremental changes, usually to improve workflows and processes. Adaptive change management has little to no impact on the facility’s or organization’s business model.
Transformation change management significantly impacts an organization’s overall mission, culture and business model, often with substantial changes that affect operations. With transformational change management, an organization may see a complete overhaul of its business structure or functioning.
How to Implement a Change Management Model
Implementing change management typically involves following several steps:
- Define the change: Identify significant and insignificant areas for change. An organization also needs to choose its change management team and have that team introduce the updates to other staff, so part of this step is communicating with team members.
- Create a plan: The change plan should allow the organization to implement new technology and workflows across all departments. The more detailed the plan, the better. It should walk people through step by step, explaining exactly what your organization needs to do.
- Implement the plan: Each team member needs to follow the plan’s steps to allow the organization to reach its goals. Obstacles may come up at this point, so organizational leaders need to anticipate those challenges and work to find solutions for them.
- Analyze data: As plan implementation goes on, your organization will have access to data and results. Analyzing the data allows you to see whether you’ve reached your goals and if there is still room for growth and adjustments.
- Make adjustments: Based on the data analysis, make changes to the plan to improve results. These adjustments further enhance your operations, maximizing your efforts.
MicroHealth Provides Technology-Driven Health Care Solutions
MicroHealth embraces change with Agile project management, providing technology-driven solutions for the evolving health care industry. With extensive project management experience supporting federal health IT projects, we navigate complexities and drive innovation. Our tailored solutions optimize operations and deliver exceptional care. Contact our team today to learn more about how you can thrive amidst change with MicroHealth.