Value Improvement Leaders (VIL) is a 13 week leadership course offered at University of Utah Health that teaches the skills needed to provide sponsorship and leadership for value improvement work. Principles taught are taken from Lean, Six Sigma, and PDSA methodologies. The course explains theory, provides healthcare examples of many specific leadership techniques, and uses an applied learning model. Not everyone can take the course, but everyone can follow along with the lesson plan.

If Apple Maps and Garmin can provide just-in-time information, why can’t health care? Lots of legitimate reasons, but we’re making significant strides. This week, the Dojo goes moto as Ken Kawamoto, Associate Chief Medical Information Officer and Director of Knowledge Management and Mobilization, helps us understand how we’re creating better information at the right time.

We asked Zac Watne, Utah’s payment innovation manager (he gets paid to understand the volatile world of payment reform) to give us a primer on “bundles.” Regardless of change happening in health care, thought leaders predict that payment reform, and specifically, bundled payments, are here to stay. Why? Bundles deliver care with improved outcomes at a lower price all over the United States. In this post, Zac addresses how long it takes to get paid.

Improving value in health care means tackling long-standing problems. These problems have seemingly simple solutions, but just won’t stay fixed. Fixing the old problems of health care requires new problem solving skills. Nurse manager Jamie D’Ausilio used University of Utah Health’s value improvement methodology to confront one of the most common management challenges—unnecessary overtime. Using concepts from lean and six sigma, D’Ausilio identified waste, prioritized root causes, and engaged her team to design interventions to create new workflow design.

Pareto analyses separate the vital few from the trivial many. It’s a narrowing tool used by data-driven lean six sigma facilitators to bring focus to a value improvement effort. Steve walks us through an example in today’s Dojo.

This little list is to help lean six sigma (LSS) practitioners communicate more effectively. Communicating is 50-80% of the work in LSS and the concepts are often counterintuitive, so Steve's developed this list to make your life easier—avoid these.

Facilitation is the art of guiding a team through a problem-solving process. It requires a set of skills that can be learned. In this week’s dojo Steve takes on the first of many facilitation topics. This is where we leave the linear process space and enter the equally important but circuitous people space.

If in previous dojo posts, you still haven’t found what you’re looking for, today’s post will satisfy your desire. In it we describe the mysterious ways of Drs. Chris Hull’s and Mark Eliason’s clinic practice. Unless you’re a patient, you can’t witness their clinic, but this post is even better than the real thing.

Project management isn’t hard—IF you know how to do it. Project management expert Kripa Kuncheria provides a wealth of resources to guide you step-by-step from project concept through completion, loaded with examples and templates you can use right now.

When a mistake happens, we promise we will never let it happen again. The problem is that a personal vow doesn’t change the way the system operates. Value engineers Steve Johnson, Cindy Spangler and Will McNett look at common personal incident—backing into the lamppost in your own front yard—as a lens for eliminating risk.

Why do we like pie charts so much? Because it’s food? Is it the fun colors? Are we soothed by the paradox of an unending cycle implied by something so perfectly complete? Elton John’s lyrics are true, no? “All are agreed as they join the stampede...” pie charts are overused.

In this week’s dojo Steve takes a look back at the Project Charter with a dramatic retelling of actual history.