Problem:

Working in healthcare can be overwhelming and paperwork, as in most types of businesses, can be pushed to the bottom. In this situation, for an assessment form to be in compliance with state regulations, it needed to be completed and signed off within 5 days. As we were brought in to improve the problem, the process had the following issues:

• Over 120 assessments past the 5-day compliance window.

• Three employees were spending 20+ hours per week pulling, manipulating, and sharing data with the larger team. Due to this, the data could only be updated 3 times per week and only when all 3 employees were available to do their part.

• Excel was being used to share detailed information, hiding the severity of the issue through the use of multiple tabs and multiple highlighting colors. Also causing different sources of truth, depending on which spreadsheet was opened.

• There was no centralized feedback loop for future analysis of the reasons for assessments to be out of compliance.

Solution:

Stepping in from outside any process, one of the most important things to do is bring in transparency. Our first step was to get away from anecdotal comments and truly show in an easily digestible manner how the assessments are tracking. Our second step was to create an enhanced data flow for end users to focus on information important to them. Each of these steps was solved through the creation of interactive dashboards.

Phase 1:

The first dashboard was specifically built for the manager level and above. The main features of the dashboard were:

• Total open assessments in bold at the top of the dashboard

• Breakdown, by bar chart, of timeframe for the open assessments (0-5 days; 5-10 days; 10-30 days; 30+ days)

• Bubble chart, using size and color, showing which floors have the most assessments during a user-selected time period (default Last 30 days), as well as percentage of assessments still open.

By presenting these three simple visuals, we immediately put information at the fingertips of the management team. This transparency was evident from our first meeting, where our numbers were questioned. Calling in the lead project manager to confirm our results, this validation led to an immediate call-to-action. In short, transparency led to management having an in-depth discussion with the project manager about what roadblocks existed in getting these results to a much more reasonable level. Without transparency, management had put someone in charge, but had never spent the time to actually understand the reasons for the delays and therefore not truly supported the project manager.

Phase 2:

At this point, we then built our second interactive dashboard to help provide information directly to the employees who are responsible for closing these assessments. At the same time, we focused on ensuring that the 20+ person-hours spent pulling, manipulating, and sharing the data went down to 0. The main features of the second dashboard included:

• Total open assessments in bold at the top of the dashboard

• Interactive floor-level bar chart broken out by current assessment step. This allowed floor managers to see how many assessments were still open and where they were in the process.

• Assessment detail, including an option to Add Comments as to why an assessment may be stuck or rejected. This feedback spot allows for analysis of the most common reasons for a delayed completion.

• Open assessment timeframe filter (0-5 days; 5-10 days; 10-30 days; 30+ days) allowing users to immediately hone in on keeping up-to-date with the newest assessments, while clearing the backlog as time permits.

Results:

Within two weeks of implementing this dashboard, several improvements were apparent:

• There were now zero hours spent pulling, manipulating, and sharing the data.

• The dashboard was now refreshed automatically nightly, so users could expect up-to-date, rather than lagging, results.

• Open assessments dropped from 120+ to 30+ and the percentage of assessments closed within the 5-day timeframe drastically increased.

• End users, even though having a wide-range of computer literacy, were all engaging with the dashboard.