Monthly Archives: July 2019

Not so secret shopper

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If you work at a healthcare system, most likely you get your care there as well. As IT professionals we have an opportunity to be “not so secret shoppers”. In other words, if we tell the clinical and administrative canstockphoto28401496 (1) good or badstaff we have contact with as a patient that we are in IT, we will probably get an earful – both good and bad.

I always make a point of being a not so secret shopper. I want to hear what our users think of the systems we provide and support – good or bad. If I hear about actionable items, I follow-up with the right people afterwards.

This week, I had the chance to be on the patient side of systems. Believe me, I would rather have not been. After a severe toothache all weekend, I called my dentist back home Monday morning. I was hoping to get a prescription for an antibiotic (assuming the pain was due to infection) and something for pain stronger than the over-the-counter ibuprofen and Tylenol I’d been taking. But their protocol was no prescribing unless they saw me. Being hundreds of miles away at my interim engagement, I said that didn’t work for me. So, what was I to do? They said to call my PCP (also hundreds of miles away) or go to an urgent care center.

So, Monday night, I headed off to the University of Vermont Medical Center Urgent Care.  New patient check-in, registration, nurse triage and then to the exam room to wait for a physician to see me.

The wait was minimal at each step and everyone was extremely friendly. At registration I heard enthusiasm about the Epic system coming November 1st and that they would no longer have to use two different systems. The registration clerk said it will be a change and take time getting used to, but that having just one system would be so much better.

With the triage nurse, I realized I didn’t have my medication allergies stored as a note in on my iPhone as I thought I did. I rely on the fact that they are in my medical chart at my healthcare system back home. Continue reading →

“We’re at meeting norms”

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That’s a new phrase for me. One I’m still getting used to at my current interim engagement in IT at the University of Vermont Health Network. Said like that, it means it’s 10 minutes to the hour and time to wrap canstockphoto15517676 (1) meeting normsup the meeting. Time for people to shut down any video conferencing, clear the room, take a bio-break and get to their next meeting. And for others to come in and get set up for the next meeting to start right on time. And start on time they do.

This is a meeting discipline that makes a lot of sense and everyone seems to have adapted to it. As the new outsider, I’m still getting used to it and trying my best to conform. Get there on time and if chairing the meeting, wrap up by 10 minutes to the hour (5 minutes if it’s a 30-minute meeting).

Other meeting norms the IT department has established include all agendas and meeting materials available in advance as part of the meeting invite, not sent around separately as emails with attachments. I was told early on that if a meeting doesn’t have an agenda, you’re free to not attend the meeting. While I’ve seen no specific guideline on this, I wouldn’t be surprised. Another way to ensure meetings have purpose and a plan for the time. Continue reading →

Good email practices – lead by example

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Have you ever gone through hundreds of email post vacation trying to catch up and found too many branches on one subject making it difficult to quickly get the full picture on that issue? canstockphoto17451721 (1) email

Have you ever read through a long email trail when you are in a new organization and many different people are weighing in – you don’t know who they are or what they do because there are no signatures, just a first name?

Have you ever had that sense that too much project management is happening via email?

Have you ever tried to find an email but there is no subject or useful subject to search on?

Have you ever lost the thread because the email trail is now on an entirely different topic but still carries the original unrelated subject line?

Have you ever looked at an email trail and wondered why someone doesn’t just pick up the phone or do a quick huddle with the right people to resolve the issue?

If the answer to any of these questions are “yes”, you may share some of my frustrations with managing email.

So, what do we do? Complain or lead by example? Continue reading →

Vacation season – make the most of it!

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We’re heading into the July 4th weekend and summer is already a third over. Hopefully you have made plans for a break of some sort with family or friends in the next few months. My colleagues in Vermont say canstockphoto21032568 (1) red white blue chairsJuly is the most popular time for vacations since it’s the only nice month of the year. Those of us in the northern parts of the country truly do appreciate our precious few summer months.

Remember the 6 R’s of summer – rest, relax, refresh, renew, reflect and reboot. And if you have to work or keep in touch with work while you take a break – check out “4 tips when you must work on vacation”.

Happy 4th of July to all!  Enjoy the rest of your summer and try not to think about when the first snowfall will happen. It’s still a long way off!

Related Posts:

4 tips when you must work on vacation

Take time to reboot

The 6 R’s of summer