HUDSON, Fla., Sept. 9 Workforce Prescriptions ("WRX") announced on Tuesday the launch of the Paradigm Award. The Paradigm Award is a national quality award, funded by a private endowment, developed to honor hospitals that have gone above and beyond in their efforts to foster efficient labor practices without resorting to workforce reductions or dramatic top-down mandates.
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"It's not an easy thing to make the paradigm shift in understanding required to see that the number of staff or hours worked are NOT the primary culprits of labor dependency," states Charlie Dawson, President of Workforce Prescriptions. He goes on to say, "It took us 3 years of gathering over 1500 data points on hundreds of hospitals just to determine what the root causes of labor waste actually were. It is no wonder that many healthcare leaders believe that downsizing and wholesale program cutting are the best ways to attack labor expense."
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Workforce Prescriptions, the award sponsor, defines itself with a single philosophy: While it may be quicker and easier to cut jobs or mandate program changes, the only long term sustainable way of reducing labor expense is to first identify the root causes of the waste . . . the broken & legacy processes, missed communications, mathematical difficulties of staff scheduling, outdated measurements & policies that fail to address expensive behaviors.
Dean Kristiniak, COO of Workforce Prescriptions comments, "The Paradigm Award is an extremely significant achievement! Based on initial benchmarking, only a very few select organizations are performing (in labor management) at a level that will qualify them for the award. Their successes in creating measurable improvements in labor efficiency without unduly burdening staff or requiring artificial accountability define them as organizations with exemplary leadership teams and cultures of care!"
As a result of the difficulty of sustaining labor excellence, the award will be conferred during a press conference where: the organization's accomplishments are detailed, a national press release & white paper are launched, the statue is conferred, celebration support material bearing the Paradigm logo are provided and a cash award of $10,000 is presented to the hospital.
There is no fee for application and any adult acute hospital can begin the process by signing up for and completing an online self assessment. The self assessment requires "C" level staff to rate their institution in 84 dimensions of labor competence. The sponsoring organization is very encouraging of hospitals that want to apply but aren't sure if their performance level is high enough to win.
According to Keith Bush, CIO at WRX, "When applying, hospitals shouldn't worry about whether they are already efficient with labor. We have automated the self assessment, allowing them to move through the application process at their own pace, and we don't charge an application fee, encouraging every hospital to participate. One of the great things we've been able to produce is a Pay IQ report for most US hospitals which can be found on our website at http://www.workforcerx.org. This report will give a hospital a quick view of their labor efficiency and allow them to more effectively determine their standing. Completing the self assessment will allow them to further identify areas of opportunities as the gap report it produces is designed to allow them to begin making improvements without the need to hire consultants or file a formal application!"
Those who do achieve qualifying scores on the self assessment will be contacted directly and will be invited to complete a formal application, reviewed by the award committee that requests key documents, reports, interviews and other information necessary to validate the results of the self assessment.
More information about the Paradigm Award as well as step-by-step instructions for applying can be found at: http://www.paradigmaward.org/
About Workforce Prescriptions
Workforce Prescriptions is an evidence-based consulting firm headquartered in Hudson, FL that provides assistance to hospitals desiring to: enhance revenues, reduce their cost of labor & length of stay or to improve their work practices/processes. Workforce Prescriptions focuses primarily in the not-for-profit sector of healthcare in order to "assist those organizations whose own mission requires them to take extraordinary risks in order to ensure access to quality healthcare for the neediest of Americans." Workforce Prescriptions can be found online at: http://www.workforcerx.org
SOURCE Workforce Prescriptions
