Beginning with the correct end in mind
“Seven habits of highly effective people” written by Stephen Covey in 1989, discussed seven important steps. He promotes what he labels "The Character Ethic": aligning one’s values with so-called "universal and timeless" principles. Covey adamantly refuses to conflate principles and values; he sees principles as external natural laws, while values remain internal and subjective. Covey proclaims that values govern people's behavior, but principles ultimately determine the consequences.
One of those habits is to “Begin with the end in mind.”
In healthcare built environment projects, this habit has typically been practiced but with the wrong definition of “the end.” In a healthcare project, the end is often identified as the project conclusion, with success being measured by how well it met the budget and schedule. However, the true end is how well the facility functions and fidelity to the design intent.
The measure of that functionality should be described within the functional program, validated within the safety risk assessment, and tested during commissioning and activation. Additional measures include staff effectiveness, satisfaction, competence and ultimately, patient outcomes.
When the true end of a healthcare built environment is marginalized to only looking to the end of the project to meet schedule and budget, the voice of the customer, or stakeholder, is nearly always diminished.
Elevation Healthcare Advisors brings that voice to early conversations. Doing so augments the discussions to include the voice of the customer without the emotional attachment of the existing process.
Elevation assists the governing body responsible for the safe and effective utilization of the future space by:
Identifying current suboptimal and/or noncompliant processes, and the risks that accompany those issues.
Providing insight and applicability of existing best practices and evidence based knowledge that are proven and relevant to the project.
Quantifying projected cost and value statements to those processes and technologies
Analyzing the scope of project for comprehensive inclusion of relevant components and/or specific exclusion of project items. (Including FGI compliance, equipment planning, schedule, budgets, insurance, risks assessments, total building commissioning, facility activation, staff on-boarding/training and continuous operations.)
