Create a Team Charter

The Quality Improvement Team and Project Management

Performance improvement teams involve a lot of people and they are time consuming and therefore expensive. It has been found that in healthcare, PI activities do not ALWAYS require a team approach. We should not automatically assemble a team to make corrections; we should first decide if it is an improvement opportunity that requires the team approach, or if it is just a matter of further education and training. Three typical approaches to the PI process are a blitz team, an educational training program, and functional or cross-functional PI team. Let’s look closer at each of these.

Blitz Team

Leaders of an organization may decide that they already have all of the facts and data they need about an improvement opportunity. A Blitz Team is put together for issues that can be fixed quickly without a lot of research or data gathering. Typically, individuals are gathered who are very familiar with the process to be improved, and the team can quickly plan a new process or process updates and take steps to put the new process into action.

Training

Not all improvement opportunities need a full team approach. If it can be decided that education and training will likely be all it takes to improve a process, then there is no need to spend the time and resources to put a team together and go through the lengthy PI process. Instead, training can be planned and conducted by HR or by a manager in the department involved with the process.

Functional and Cross-Functional Teams

When it is necessary to put a team together for the PI process, that team may be functional or cross-functional. A functional team will consist of members from just one department. Think of a department as “a function.” So, the improvement opportunity is one that only affects that department. However, if the issue effects multiple departments, then the team should be cross-functional, meaning that the team will consist of staff from each of those departments.

FUNCTIONAL TEAM

Staff from a single department or service area

 

 

CROSS-FUNCTIONAL

Staff from multiple departments or service areas

Effective Teams

How do we ensure that these teams are effective? First, the team must know what is expected of them throughout the process. Teams are most effective when the members experience team problem solving as part of the organizations culture. If they live it and see it every day, and it is modeled by the leaders of the organization, then the team members will be better able to problem solve within the team structure. As with all teams, attitude is everything. It is best to choose team members who will have positive attitudes about what the team is out to accomplish. It is also very important that members chosen have an interest in the process to be improved, because they work closely with it in their daily jobs. As for team size, it seems to be most effective to have around 8-10 members.

Here are some questions to ask when trying to decide who should be on the team.

Which departments or disciplines are involved in the process?

Who are the customers of the process?

Who supplies the process? (who provides a product or service that begins the process to be improved)

Team Roles

Team Leader: The Team Leader is the organizer of the team. They are responsible for the teams work and should be sure that the new process will meet customers’ needs. The leader chosen should be well respected and able to take the initiative to move the team forward toward their goals.

Team Facilitator: The Team Facilitator acts as the advisor and consultant to the team, so they should know the PI process and QI tools. The facilitator trains the team about the PI process and helps them work through the process. There isn’t always a Team Facilitator, but there should always be a Team Leader.

Team Member: The team members are all of those who participate and make decisions and plans. They identify opportunities for improvement. Throughout the process they help to gather, prioritize and analyze data and then share knowledge, information and data that pertain to the process. Their input is very important, because they are the ones who are closest to the process being considered.

Team Recorder/Scribe: The team recorder does all of the writing, notes, and documentation for the team. They should be someone who likes to write, can be committed to getting documentation done quickly, and will keep the group supplied with all of the information that they need.

Team Charter

Once the team has been established and everyone knows what their role is, it is time to put together a Team Charter. The team charter is basically a summary of everything the team has been charged It will include timelines and deadlines and any restrictions such as perhaps a budget, or time restrictions for example. If the team gets off track for any reason, the team leader can direct them back to the charter for a reminder of the direction they should be going.

Some Team Resources

An important part of the PI team is the Mission Statement, the Vision, and the Value Statements. These are guiding principles for the team and should be established in the very first team meeting.

Establishing ground rules for the team will help to make things go more smoothly. The ground rules are about discipline. They set up the expectations and inform each member of the accepted behavior and their role in making the team successful.

Some items for ground rules might be:

Attendance

Time management

Participation

Communication

Decision making

Documentation

Room arrangements

Cleanup

Team Success:

The success of the team will depend, in part, on the interactions of the team members and the communication in the meetings. The team leader may have to step in to help with some of the team interactions. All members must use good listening and questioning techniques. It will take practice and patience to deal with conflicting personalities. Questioning techniques can be used to direct the group interactions in a positive direction.

Just as you are seeing in your course project, conflicting personalities and attitudes will often come into play in any team situation. Hopefully the team leader will be able to smooth over some of the tensions and to redirect conversations that get off the topic and take a negative turn. If dealt with correctly, most of these issues can be overcome.

The Project Life Cycle

As you can see, project management is a complex and important task. There are proven ways that projects should be successfully managed and experience in project management will certainly help to bring a project from start to end with the best results possible.

 

TYPICAL LIFE CYCLE STEPS

Initiation – opportunity for improvement is identified

Sponsorship – by top leadership

Team Member Selection

Mission Statement – a first priority

Planning

Design

Execution

Closure