Embedding a quality management system (QMS) is a team sport – demanding a combination of technical and collaborative skills. It requires working together across functions and QMS aspects – ensuring you have the right mix of roles and responsibilities.
On the technical side, QMS requires process design, analytical skills, risk management and audit. But commitment, rigorous problem solving, inspiring leadership and effective communication across specialities are equally important.
Clearly identify the roles and skills you have and devote considerable energy to connecting them. You may also identify specialist skills that you don’t have internally. In such cases some organisations engage external partners – albeit this can be costly and many organisations have made progress without such support.
- The Board has a critical role in ensuring strategic connectivity between quality planning, quality control, quality improvement and quality assurance. They should have the knowledge and understanding of the organisation’s chosen improvement approach and methodologies, its definition of quality and key metrics. They need the skills to review data and engage with executives about trends in relation to meeting patient needs.
- Leaders need subject matter expertise, as well as knowledge and understanding of organisational aims and how their organisation works. They need to understand variation and appreciate the psychology of change. Leaders need the skills to understand how system-wide priorities are being met, and to make resource and planning decisions. Leaders also need skills in building and facilitating connections between Quality Management System (QMS) aspects.
- Staff across the organisation need ‘hands on’ knowledge and experience of day-to-day processes and services to meet patient and service user needs, the organisation’s improvement methodology and how to implement small incremental changes through, for example, Plan-Do-Study-Act (PDSA) cycles. Staff need the skills to understand, on a daily basis, if their work is consistently meeting quality standards. They need to be able to act to minimise unwarranted variation and improve processes when required.
- Patients and service users should be involved as active partners in managing quality. This should include identifying population needs, feeding back on experiences of services, driving improvements and setting and auditing against standards and metrics. This means patients and service users need to be supported to have the appropriate skills and capabilities to fully participate.
Identify skills you don’t have and learn from other sectors - Read the article Can we import improvements from industry to healthcare?