Readiness for change - an adopter's diagnostic tool

The Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (USA) has a fabulous tool that can be used by potential adopters in helping them decide whether to adopt an innovation in their organisation. Whilst the questions appear rather basic, they are comprehensive, evidence based and the way in which the diagnostic has been put together really helps the decision-making process.

I commend it to you.

Download the PDF Diagnostic here

Readiness for spread, dissemination, scaling up

Spread, scaling up, dissemination, diffusion - whatever you want to calls it - does NOT happen in healthcare in the automatic "tipping point" way of Gladwell.  This is largely because in healthcare, the NHS being one great example, the desire to spread is a top-down prescriptive one - which is most companies would be dealt with a a large scale implementation project.  Similarly, just focusing on how to describe and communicate  the innovation is not enough. (I've written about this in previous posts.)

Whatever you call it and whatever methods you use, there is evidence that there are some key factors which need to be in place before you set off on a large scale "thingy".  These are not clever, and, in fact, are annoyingly obvious. Obvious does not mean simple.  You already know about the list below and one major step forward in your large scale work is to examine why you're not working on these "readiness" factors.

1. Strategic focus: if the imitative is not named and talked about in the organisation (and team) level as a strategic piece of work to do, then it's probably not a large scale change or one which will be given priority
2. Executive sponsor: who in the organisation is responsible and accountable for the implementation (not the planning) of the change?
3. Day-to-day leadership: is the initiative being talked about?
4. Spread aim: is there a clear aim and method of measuring progress for spread / scaling up?
5. Spread / scaling up Plan: is there one? Is there one that scales down each level of implementation?
6. Costs: are the costs of the change clear? DO they include the staff time coasts? Is there an agreed ROI for the scale up?
7. How will fidelity be ensured? (Fidelity = what is scaled up / spread is the same as the initiator project)

Some references:

(There are many references available in peer-reviewed papers, however, as many of you have complained you don't have access to these, I have listed some more general and open access references. If you know of other easy access references then please comment on this blog.)

• IHI: A framework for spread
• Agency for Healthcare Research & Quality: Innovation readiness for spread
• Some of my books: Rolling out your project includes a whole section on diagnosing readiness for change. 

Choosing the right chart to show your project progress and performance

Essential to any improvement project and spread / adoption campaign is a system to measure progress. An Excel produced bar or line chart on the regulation maroon and blue is suggestive of either a lazy monitoring process or one which is not turning data into useful information.

In large programs fundholders often like to see comparisons between one sub-project or site and another. Or maybe you are interested in how the results are stacking up as a whole; for example, are all the sites adopting all the elements of the new project? Do you know the best way to show a trend of your data? What about relationships between different data?

A favourite place to download Excel templates for your charting needs can be found at the Chart Chooser. Best of all, you can work out which template best suits your needs using their diagnostic process.

Do you have any templates for charts used to monitor the spread / adoption process or project improvement that you would like to share? Leave your comments below.

Social Marketing Campaign Diagnotic Tool Free Download

Download the tool for free from http://tinyurl.com/9gajn3

So you’ve decided to to use a social marketing approach? You may already have
drawn up plans for your campaign. The purpose of this tool is to provide you with a
checklist where you can run through some key aspects and assess your progress.

When to use this tool:
When starting a campaign; it will help you think through all the steps
When plans are already drawn up; you will have the opportunity to reflect and test before you start
When you have already started; you can check your progress against the items in here and assess where you may need to carry out some
additional work on a contingency basis
When you have completed; the headings in this tool provide you with the basis of an evaluation

How to use it:
􀀵 Calculate your scores
􀀵 Make notes
􀀵 Hold discussions
􀀵 Reflect
􀀵 Act on any changes you think may be necessary

The tool covers
1. How the campaign is defined
2. How the problem is defined and understood
3. Choice of comunication strategy
4. Implementation system