Communication

Q: What’s new?

• Our new Team-Tested Practices toolkits bring together all the ingredients you need to help your team succeed. Find out what other teams have done to improve, click to get the tools like the ones they used—and download a few fun goodies.
• We’ve made finding exactly what you need as easy (and fun!) as shopping for shoes online. Use our new navigation to filter by region, topic, department, format and team level.
• Our search engine is better, faster and more streamlined. Find what you need—without having to wade through a bunch of stuff you don’t want.
• The new site is fully responsive—so you can access it from any smartphone or tablet, at work or on the road.

Q: Where did my region’s page go?

A: Click on the About LMP tab to see the Regions page.  

Q: Where can I find tools?

A: Under the new Library tab—at LMPartnership.org/tools, and from a prominent link on the home page. Take advantage of the improved navigation and filter by topic, team level, dimension, role, tool type and format.

Q: Where did the videos go?

A: Find videos under the new Library tab. Or go directly to LMPartnership.org/videos. Zero in on exactly what you need by filtering by topic, region, team level and dimension.

Q: Where are the stories?

A:  Find stories under the new Library tab. You’ll find some stories under the Team-Tested Practices tab. These toolkits pair stories of teams with the kinds of tools the teams used to improve performance and meet their goals. This will make it easier for your team to follow in their footsteps for success. Stories you’ve read in Hank are under the Library tab and at LMPartnership.org/hank.

Q: Where is the UBT section?

A: The new Path to Performance section has most of the material you used to find in the UBT section; click on the tab or go directly to LMPartnership.org/path-to-performance. Find a customized kit of tools and materials tailored to any team level and P2P dimension. Or explore everything available for any one of the seven dimensions of performance (sponsorship, leadership, training, team process, team member engagement, use of tools, and goals and performance).

Q: Where is the Path to Performance toolkit?

A:  To access most of the materials that used to be in the Path to Performance toolkit, visit the new Path to Performance tab or go directly to LMPartnership.org/path-to-performance. With just a few clicks, find a customized kit of tools and materials tailored to the team level and P2P dimension you want. Or explore everything available for any one of the seven dimensions of performance (sponsorship, leadership, training, team process, team member engagement, use of tools, and goals and performance).

Q: Where did the toolkits go?

A: These are now our new How-To Guides. They're linked to from our LMP Focus Area pages, in the Path to Performance section, and elsewhere. To get a list of them all, go to LMPartnership/tools and then under the "Tool Type" option, select "How To Guides." 

Q: Where can I send feedback? 

A: Email Laureen.X.Lazarovici@kp.org, the LMP communication team's managing editor. 

It’s not hard to figure out why people are hesitant to speak up at work. Offering a suggestion for improvement or pointing out when you think something isn’t right exposes a person to any number of possible responses—many of them unpleasant.

There’s the sarcastic retort. There’s the deafening silence. There’s the reply, pointing out exactly why you’re wrong, delivered in the nicest of tones but carrying an unmistakable edge of one-upsmanship. Who needs it? Who wants to create waves and risk a good job?

But when we don’t speak up, we put health and happiness at risk. As Doug Bonacum, Kaiser Permanente’s vice president of quality, safety and resource management, says in this issue’s cover story, speaking up “is mission critical for worker and patient safety.”

In addition to the moral imperative of protecting people from injury, there’s a strong economic incentive for speaking up. Improvement doesn’t typically come from a single person’s great idea—it comes from people sharing ideas. And we at KP have to keep improving, finding ways to deliver care as good as or better than we deliver now with fewer dollars per member. Our future depends on it.  

Since we get good at what we practice, we each have to practice speaking up. Practice means starting with lots of baby steps—don’t tackle the high-stakes stuff first! And let’s practice being good listeners, too, providing the space that lets others speak up safely.

The Labor Management Partnership and unit-based teams provide the framework for transforming what Bonacum calls a “culture of fear” around speaking up. But with that framework in place, it’s still up to each and every one of us to find the courage to address the immediate, particular obstacles that keep us silent.