To engage and empower employees so they can consistently deliver the best patient experience possible, Insight Training Solutions (ITS) and Orlando Orthopaedic Center (OOC) have partnered to develop a custom employee engagement and training initiative.

The program employs a unique blend of bitesize (8-minute) on-demand training that employees can access anywhere coupled with offline activities including friendly contests amongst departments to boost morale and retention of the material.

To date, the results have largely been positive, with the rate of online reviews for the practice rising by almost 40%. Employees also report feeling more engaged and satisfied in their work on post-course feedback surveys.

“Engaged employees can lead to higher online reputation scores, increased employee retention, better work culture and, ultimately, a superior patient experience,” says Jennifer Thompson, president of ITS. “When employees feel invested, they are more engaged, patient-focused, and able to deliver an overall positive patient experience. This becomes especially important to practices where potential patients have a choice in their physician and often use online review sites to determine who will provide their care.”

In fact, it was recently reported that healthcare and medical centers with a 4.5 to 4.9-star rating earn 20% more than average (source). Considering other studies find up to 75% of patient interactions occur with staff, and only 25% with the physicians, the need for a focus on patient experience becomes even more apparent.

Employee engagement and retention are also contributing factors to develop ongoing professional development for medical practices with 93% of employees stating they would stay with a company longer if that company invested in their careers (source). Companies with engaged employees are also reported to outperform those without engaged employees by up to 202% (source).

Unique to the partnership, the ITS team developed several initiatives to create sustainability and improve employee and physician buy-in including:

• Pre- and post-training surveys to provide custom benchmarks and measurements
• Department-based competitions to serve as team building activities
• Prize giveaways, including custom “swag” to wear on uniforms
• A competition where patients and employees are given a “token of appreciation” and encouraged to pay it forward to team members going “above and beyond”
• A 20 x 15-foot mural on the wall of their main office, designed to visually represent feedback from OOC employees when asked what patient experience means to them

“We recognize our patients have a lot of choices when it comes to their orthopaedic care, but we also realize employees have a lot of choices when it comes to their employer as well,” says Kevin Joyce, executive director of Orlando Orthopaedic Center. “That’s why a big focus for us this year is to engage our employees to help us focus on enhancing the overall patient experience at our practice. We’re investing in ongoing professional development to provide our team with the skills necessary in today’s practice environment.”

To learn more or sign up for a free “Rockstar Customer Service” trial of the on-demand training, click here.