The Seven Deadly Sins of medical staff leaders

A year ago, Peggy Greeley and I wrote a book that contains a chapter called the "Seven Deadly Sins" for medical staff professionals. This chapter was a take-off from W. Edwards Deming's management philosophy and his "Seven Deadly Diseases." As I was reviewing some of this material recently, I started thinking about deadly sins for medical staff leaders.

This column is entirely from my point of view and is based on many years of working with and observing the behaviors of successful medical staff leaders (and sadly, some who have not been successful).

1. Failure to have any goals and objectives
   It is very sad when a medical staff president says that his or her goal for the year (or two years) is to just get through the term of office without having a hearing or any "black marks" from The Joint Commission. I'm working with a medical staff organization where the legacy of the current leaders will be design and implementation of a criteria-based privileging system. Which legacy is going to give a medical staff leader the most satisfaction, and be most important to excellent patient care? You be the judge.
2. Failure to learn his or her job
   I just spent a weekend in Palm Springs, CA, with hundreds of medical staff leaders who were there to learn about their roles and responsibilities and how to be successful as a medical staff leader. Education about roles and responsibilities is critical, whether it means attending a seminar, having an internal orientation program, or reading material targeted towards medical staff leaders. All can help a medical staff leader avoid being a mediocre leader.
3. Failure to take action when necessary
   Hoping that a problem (such as a disruptive physician, a lack of performance data to be used to evaluation competency of physicians, etc.) will just go away or get solved without any intervention is equivalent to burying your head in the sand. These problems usually don't just go away.
4. Failure to lead by example
   As a medical staff leader, you need to complete your records on time, adhere to medical staff and hospital policies and procedures, etc,. in order to be a credible leader. I remember the time, years ago, when the chief of staff at my hospital talked to the medical staff (at the urging of hospital administration) about wearing professional attire while in the hospital. The chief of staff was wearing what could only be described as clothing appropriate for the beach, not in the hospital (where the meeting was being held, by the way). As he spoke, there were loud snickers from the physicians who were attending the meeting and the message was lost.
5. Failure to develop a working relationship with the MSO
   This should be rather obvious: most staff in the medical staff office want to provide support and services to make doing your job more manageable. Meet them halfway and they will almost always do what it takes to help make your term in office a success.
6. Failure to follow policies and procedures
   The failure to create a policy where one is lacking is a failure of leadership. Remember the five Ps: It is our policy to follow our policy. In the absence of a policy it is our policy to develop a policy.
7. Failure to stand firm on issues of patient care
   Members of the medical staff organization, the board, hospital administration, and patients depend upon medical staff leaders to take a stand on issues that promote patient care and safety. Don't back down on issues that are vitally important to excellent patient care.

Until next week,

Vicki L. Searcy, CPMSM
Practice Director, Credentialing & Privileging
The Greeley Company
vsearcy@greeley.com
www.greeley.com