I've previously commented on Thomas D. Kuczmarski's innovative ideas about innovation (see Is Don Berwick the Secretary of Innovation?). I am going back to the well because An Innovation Action Plan for Obama which appeared in his March 9 Business Week web site column seemed worthy of translation from the business world to the world of health care leadership.
Mr. Kuczmarski's thesis in this column is a tonic for recessionary times: "The best way to accelerate growth, increase demand, and multiply jobs is to get management to make significant investments that will incur higher levels of risk but will also yield significantly higher returns. It's called investing in research and development, pursuing new business models, and launching new-to-the-world products or services--in short, innovation."
So how do we apply this to innovation in health care services - not typically a sector in which we think about investments this way?
Seven Points of Light
The article provides a seven point innovation plan for industry. I won't reiterate it but it's worth reading the article to get grounded in it. But preserving the titles, and tweaking it for health care, what comes out is a potential tool kit health care leaders can use to advance innovation in their organizations in lean (and even fat) times:
Graduated Tax credits for R&D Investments: Hospitals and health systems can't give tax credits but they can enter into value enhancing relationships with payors and employers. Historically these relationships have featured network limitation, care management, and risk factor attenuation strategies for favored purchasers in return for favorable pricing. How about raising the stakes - seeking dollars for investments in technology, clinical process, and patient focus innovations and creating a return for those dollars based on outcomes?
Innovation Booster Grants: How about creating "internal grant" set asides to be awarded to Departments and programs with promising innovations that meet certain focus area, performance, replicability, and exportability criteria. This is different than simply budgeting for new program development. Grants are competitive, and obtaining one is both an honor and a responsibility - to fulfill the confidence bestowed on the recipient. Results can be internally celebrated and externally published and replicated.
Innovation Awards: Different than grants, which are given in anticipation of innovation development, "merit" awards recognize unsolicited internal entrepreneurship and innovation by individuals in areas that result in improved organizational, Departmental, or program performance. They provide a personal incentive for individuals to be truly creative.
National Business Incubators and Innovation Training: These go hand in hand. The IHI, employer/business collaboratives, professional societies, etc. have already done this, of course, by creating platforms and forums for collaborative design of outcome, safety, and cost reduction innovations. If the IHI's National Forum isn't an incubator, I don't know what is. But health care leaders must recognize the ROI inherent in this work and must spiritually and financially support their staffs in attending and participating in these efforts and in training themselves and others to do the hard work of clinical process innovation. This shared investment will yield results for all.
Intellectual Property Auction: Without stretching the analogy too far, this Kuczmarski point basically addresses what to do with a surfeit of good ideas that go beyond the organization's ability to develop. In industry they can be literally auctioned to the highest bidder. In health care services you probably can't auction the ideas for dollars BUT you can distribute them on a competitive basis to organizations that show the most capacity to develop them. So in this auction the soundness of the concept represents the value and the capability and promise of the bidders, rather than cash, represent their worthiness. Think of the energy - let alone results - this type of auction might generate.
Innovation Index Fund: This Kuczmarski point might actually stand intact. Does it make sense to identify the best and most consistent organizational innovators - in a post competitive paradigm - and index some foundation and government support ("investment") for pro rata distribution based on sound criteria to provide resources for continuing innovation success?
I think what Kuczmarski is driving at, more than the seven points, is the need for leaders to be innovative in how they will encourage innovation. No reason why health care leaders can't do this as well as anyone.
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