Greetings!
If you ask any business person if they should “meet”
or “exceed” their customers expectation 99.6%
of them would reply that they should “exceed” them.
But, where are the real customer requests that support this
viewpoint?
In my lead article this week, “Who Says We Need To Exceed
Our Customers Expectations,” I will expose this myth and
give you some real life stories to support my belief
that your hospital, system or IDN is just throwing
your money away on products, services, and technologies, if
you believe that you need to “exceed” your customer’s
expectations.
|
“Where Are the Real Requests of the Customers?”
Mikio Kitano, Toyota |
We all like to say that our goal is to
“exceed our customer’s expectations”, but what does
that really mean in the real world. Should will give
them gold plated commodes or provide all of our patients
with electric wheel chairs! Well, Toyota learned the
lesson of who said you need to “exceed your customers
expectations” the hard way!
A few years ago, Toyota added to their
sticker price $5,000 in new safety features (reinforced
doors, side air bags, gas foot rests, etc.) to their
Camry thinking that more is better only to find that
they made their Camry unaffordable to their
customers. Their sales plummeted. Now Toyota’s watch
word is “Where are the real requests of the
customers” for safety features or any other upgrades
to their cars.
I had the same experience with one of my
hospital clients a few years back who had their own
in-house laundry that produced the cleanest, wrinkle and
stain free linens that I have ever seen. However, it
was costing them $100,000 more annually to provide their
patients with this outstanding service vs. outsourcing
this service to a vendor. When I asked the same
question of my client that Mikio Kitano asked his Toyota
staff, “Where are the real requests of your
customers” for this level of service -- no one could
find any requests. We therefore outsourced this service
at a savings of $100,000 annually without any complaints
from our client’s customers.
“Exceeding our customer’s expectations”
was great advertising copy in the 90s, but it
doesn’t make sense any longer if your healthcare
organization is going to survive and thrive in the 21st
century. Just give your customers what they absolutely
positively require — no more — no less and you
will find that you will meet their expectations every
time. That’s all they want!
|
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MAILBOX
I’m in charge of a four hospital regional
health system that would like to develop a supply value
analysis program for all of our hospitals. Is this a
realistic goal? R.W.
I believe this is not only a realistic goal
but also a doable goal, because your four hospitals can
share the cost of a coordinator, training of your teams and
software to plan, organize, functionally analyze, measure,
document and implement supply chain savings for your health
system. Since a supply value analysis program
traditionally gives any organization a $25:$1 ROI all
systems and IDN’s should be looking to do what you are
thinking about.
Remember, value analysis is much more than
hiring a person and telling them to go save money!
Good
luck,
Bob
Yokl, Sr.
Chief Value Strategist
Strategic Value Analysis In
Healthcare
800-220-4274
bobpres@strategicvalueanalysis.com
P.S. If anyone
else has a burning question that you would like me to answer, please
call or e-mail me and I would be delighted to answer.
There Is Still “Gold In them Thar Hills”
Generic Products Can Quickly Save Your Hospital 10%, 12% or
even 19% On Your Supply Budget
We All Use
Generic Products At Home, But When It Comes To Our Hospitals
We Avoid Them For No Good Reason!
I’m a
BIG proponent of the use of generic products at
home (aspirin, paper towels, vitamins, chemicals, plastic
trash can liners, etc.) and in hospitals (ink cartridges,
bond paper, exam gloves, BP cuffs, catheter trays,
electrodes, etc.), because they $AVE BIG DOLLARS AND MAKE
REAL $EN$E! I even remember when I was a Vice President
of Support Services for a 27-facility nursing home chain
that I initiated the buying of generic floor
cleaners, strippers and waxes for all our facilities that
saved my nursing home chain 25% or $100,000 annually.
Yet, I
can count on one hand hospitals where I have consulted in
the last 20 years that have embraced the use of
generics as one of their tactics to control their
supply expenses. Why is this? It’s my opinion that
this is the case because hospital distributors rarely
if ever are offering generic products to hospitals, but
instead would rather sell brand names products that are much
easier to sell.
So if
you want to quickly save 10%, 12% or even 19% on your
supply budget you must search out generic products
from your GPOs and distributors who can offer you the best
buys on these com-modities. Yes, all generics aren’t
“created equal”, but with a little research
you can weed out the bad apples from the ripe juicy ones
that are ready to be picked.
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