It’s summer in Pittsburgh and one of my favorite places to enjoy the weather is on the tennis court. It seems simple enough — get the ball to the other side of the court in a way that the other player can’t return it. The reality is more complicated. So, on my journey of continuous improvement for my tennis game, I try to use best practices.
I watch the professionals play and observe their strokes, so I can apply their techniques to my game. I take lessons and get trained by a coach. Working with this combination of experts will hopefully result in a win.
In today’s world of instantaneous information, leveraging best practices should always be a starting point for our personal and professional efforts.
Many companies, like my own, combine the knowledge of experienced staff, well-thought-out processes and technology solutions into a comprehensive set of best practices to help solve customers’ most pressing challenges. These best practices are validated after analyzing data that verifies how the best practice works and the resulting outcomes.
Adoption isn’t easy
While best practices instinctively make sense, in my experience, many people struggle to fully adopt them. There is typically something in the way. It may be resource constraints, an unwillingness to change, the position that a situation is unique or a history of doing things another way.
When you step back though, it makes sense to start in the best position you can and then evolve from there. I see many situations where the decision to opt out of a best practice results in continued complexity and limited results.
Back to my tennis game — I try to adopt best practices, but my footwork doesn’t always keep up. It’s an obstacle I need to address on my way to mastering a best practice. The same applies to business. At TeleTracking, we have developed a set of best practices with specific tactics on how to adopt those practices. We realize there will be challenges along the way and we offer advice on how to overcome obstacles to make the adoption process as easy as possible.
Best practices evolve into new practices
Best practices also grow to create the next wave of best practices. Think about the original wooden tennis racket. With advances in technology and creative thinking, the racket has evolved to allow a faster, more powerful game. The same is true in business, especially in health care operations.
I recently visited a client who uses a command center that combines our solutions and best practices to manage the movement of patients in and out of the hospital, and makes it possible for patients to access the care they need. This client set up the environment using human factor design to ensure that their employees also have a positive experience, while making sure patients have access to the life-saving care they need.
Always think about using best practices wherever you can to jump-start your results — and maybe even evolve the practice with innovation and creative thinking.
Diane Watson is the COO of TeleTracking. Diane is responsible for TeleTracking’s services organization, which includes its client delivery team. She has a wealth of experience in consulting, information technology and general management. Her background includes the position of CIO at Medrad, a medical device manufacturer, as well as a long tenure at Andersen Consulting, currently Accenture.
