Change Management Strategies for Healthcare Leaders: Insights From Dr. Kim Brown-Jackson

In 2020, when restrictions and health concerns during the COVID-19 pandemic made office visits to healthcare providers difficult, many healthcare organizations implemented a major change in record time: They set up systems for more providers to be able to see patients over video links. Telehealth visits for Medicare patients during that year increased 10 times over the previous year, according to the U.S. Government Accountability Office.

This rapid response to the sudden and unexpected increase in the need for telehealth visits is an excellent example of effective change management in healthcare, says Kim Brown-Jackson, PhD, DBA, teaching faculty at Claremont Lincoln University.

“How do you get an organization to move along with you to make changes?” she says. Studies have found that up to two-thirds of projects in healthcare involving a large-scale change fail due to problems with planning, motivating workers, and communication.

However, employing a strategic approach to change can help organizations avoid or overcome such problems, Brown-Jackson says. Combining management theories with her own experience, she offers several strategies for how to successfully execute change on an organization-wide scale.

Understanding Change and Innovation in Healthcare

At the heart of many healthcare changes are innovations. People tend to think of innovations as technical, such as those related to new equipment or procedures. But even technical innovations generally demand organizational innovations as well.

In banking, for example, the advent of automated teller machines made banking much more convenient for customers, but it required redesigning the jobs of tellers.

Similarly, the advent of telehealth visits required managing changes in healthcare operations. “You still have the same requirements for the standards of care, but the delivery is different,” Brown-Jackson says. “What does it look like to be able to deliver healthcare in a different way than we did in the past?”

Another current example of innovative change in healthcare, she says, is the switch from provider-focused healthcare delivery to patient-focused healthcare delivery. Healthcare organizations are involving patients more in their treatment decisions and adopting new methods of reimbursement, such as basing payments on the health outcomes patients experience rather than on the medical procedures facilities provide.

Change, Culture, and People

When a strategy for change management in healthcare fails, Brown-Jackson says, the culprit is often a culture that hasn’t been sufficiently prepared for carrying out the changes.

Healthcare facilities need to ensure that their staff not only buy into the changes but are prepared to execute them successfully. “Maybe a hospital wants to become a magnet hospital, which means you have a certain level of requirements that all of your nurses have to meet,” she says. “If you haven’t gotten them certified, you might find that you’ve left people behind.”

The solution to this problem is to involve people at all levels in the process of making the change from the start. Brown-Jackson suggests several strategies.

• Communicate clearly what the change is about and how it will be executed.
• Explain how the change will benefit workers as well as the organization. “What’s in it for them?” Brown-Jackson says. “That’s how you get them to move along with you.”
• Arrange training and continuing education if workers need higher-level skills to implement the change.
• Involve employees in designing and implementing the solutions to organizational problems. “You find the person who works closest to the problem, and you empower them to be able to help you,” she says. “They have some of the best ideas.”

Another key change agent is the champion, she says. When a leader can’t devote their full attention to making a change happen, they can delegate someone else to play that role.

“The champions are a level below the senior leader,” she says. “They’re the people who are most connected, and they’re able to advocate on your behalf for whatever change you need to implement.”

Change Strategies Beyond Healthcare

When managing a change in healthcare, leaders shouldn’t limit themselves to models from healthcare, says Brown-Jackson. In recent years, healthcare systems have successfully adapted operations management principles from manufacturing.

Brown-Jackson herself is certified in Six Sigma, a methodology for continuous quality improvement first developed for Motorola. It maps and measures processes, gathering data to detect variations and steadily reduce defects and mistakes.

In an earlier job, she applied Six Sigma principles in the Biomedical Services division of the Red Cross, where the goal was to improve the manufacturing and delivery of blood products.

“Our goal required our business structure to be different,” she says. “We had to implement a system that has all of the checks and balances that you need for quality management.”

Her far-reaching program included the following:

• Conducting root-cause analyses to identify causes of problems and possible solutions
• Setting performance metrics to spot defects and track improvements over time
• Setting benchmarks based on those at other high-quality organizations
• Training and certifying staff in new standards and operations.

Staff training took time, but it paid off by making the goals clear to all participants. “They didn’t just throw you in the deep end without knowing what you needed to do,” she says. “Everyone at different levels of the strategy were also able to come together and talk the same language.”

Teaching Change Management in Healthcare

To be equipped to manage change in today’s complex healthcare systems, Brown-Jackson recommends professionals earn a master’s in healthcare administration. In the Master of Arts in Healthcare Administration (MHA) at Claremont Lincoln University, Brown-Jackson covers topics like quality management, which overlaps with many areas of organizational change.

She orients her lessons toward changes her students — many of them working professionals — are already trying to manage in their jobs. She encourages them to share their problems, so they can get feedback from both her and their fellow students.

Brown-Jackson describes her teaching process as andragogy. It’s a participatory style of teaching aimed at self-directed adults who measure what they’re learning by actively trying it out. She contrasts it with the more traditional pedagogy, in which students passively receive information and take tests on it.

In andragogy, she says, “you learn about the theories or conceptual frameworks, and you can try to apply them in real time. You actually can put it into practice.”

Learn More About Change Management and Healthcare Administration

Managing change in a modern healthcare system is a complicated endeavor with many facets, ranging from the technical to the cultural. Enrolling in a degree program like the online MHA program at Claremont Lincoln University can help professionals develop the in-depth knowledge and experience needed to manage the multiple aspects of change.

Covering a wide variety of key management topics, the program is delivered in an online format, allowing students to learn on their own schedules while continuing to work at their current jobs.

Explore how the MHA program at Claremont Lincoln University can help prepare you for making changes and innovations to better care for patients in the world of healthcare.