Value Analysis Non-Salary Expense Reduction Supply Chain Management Savings

REALITY CHECK: Are You Demanding or Are You Collaborating With Your Clinicians To Bring About Quality Savings Results

“I Hear MMs Saying That Their Senior Management Should Be Demanding That Their Clinician’s Change Their Outdated Methods And Practices To Produce Quality Savings Results. When In Reality This Tactic Will Produce The Opposite Results

Do you find yourself debating with your customers? Are your customers reacting defensively when your make recommendations even when you believe the exchange or dialog has been civilized. Are you spending most of your time presenting, persuading, and convincing your customers to change? If so, you are experiencing the “Adversarial Trap”, which is a lose/lose proposition for you and your customers.

When supply chain professionals spend a great deal of their time “overcoming objections” from their customers they are really positioning themselves for conflict with their customers.

To paraphrase noted consultant and trainer Jeff Thull, even polite disagreements and respectful differences of opinion create negative dynamics with your customers. At worst, it turns the savings process into a battle which the supply chain professional must somehow conquer the customer to win the argument.

If this too has been your experience it is time for a “reality check”, because no matter how genteel and polite the dialogs are with your customers, if there is conflict of any kind, the final result of these exchanges is that your relationship has become adversarial.

There are three adversarial traps that you must avoid if you are to move from demanding to collaborating with your customers to bring about quality savings results:

1. Depending on your customer’s decision-making processes to produce quality decisions and outcomes

Customers aren’t used to making complex product, service and technology purchasing decisions, so if left to their own devices they will take the easiest route in making decisions, thus, leaving out key elements of a quality decision making process!

2. Assuming that your customers understand their own problems and can evaluate all solutions available to them

Customers only see one-tenth of their supply chain iceberg, so how can you expect them to understand their own problems, or, due to time constraints, even seriously consider more than one solution that is available to them.

3. Believing that your skills in presenting, persuading and convincing will win most battles and even a few all out wars

The current strategies of presenting, persuading and convincing customers to change only creates frustration, misunderstandings and conflicts, because it still leaves your customers with the same fears, biases, and concerns they came in the door with.

All of the above traps that we have been discussing are really “systemic problems” formed by the lack of a proven, repeatable approach for our customers to make quality decisions about their product, service and technology purchases.

If you want to collaborate with your customers so that they can bring about quality savings results, then you first need your own quality decision making savings systems to replace your customer’s decision making systems that haven’t resulted in making quality decisions or outcomes in the past.

You Either Have Your Own Decision System or You We Be At The Mercy Of Someone Else’s Decision System!

If you are looking for quality savings results from your customers, I would strongly recommend that you license, buy, steal or develop your own quality decision savings system for the purchasing of the millions of dollars in products, services and technologies you purchase annually. Otherwise, I can guarantee you that you will be at the mercy of someone else’s untrustworthy decision making system that has proven itself unreliable in making good quality decisions for your healthcare organization over the years.

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Home Weekly Strategic Value Analysis Newsletter View Archived Strategic Value Analysis Newsletters Fast Target Savings Strategic^TM Value Analysis ValueNet Central^TM Value Analysis Software Training About HCP Client List Articles and White Papers Contact HCP Click Here to Access the NO Obligation Free Non-Salary Survey to find out what your savings opportunities are for your organization. Free Weekly Strategic Value Analysis Newsletter Free Web poll for your Web site - freepolls.com		September 30, 2004 by Robert T. Yokl, President REALITY CHECK: Are You Demanding or Are You Collaborating With Your Clinicians To Bring About Quality Savings Results A Debater Never Wins! “I Hear MMs Saying That Their Senior Management Should Be Demanding That Their Clinician’s Change Their Outdated Methods And Practices To Produce Quality Savings Results. When In Reality This Tactic Will Produce The Opposite Results Do you find yourself debating with your customers? Are your customers reacting defensively when your make recommendations even when you believe the exchange or dialog has been civilized. Are you spending most of your time presenting, persuading, and convincing your customers to change? If so, you are experiencing the “Adversarial Trap”, which is a lose/lose proposition for you and your customers. When supply chain professionals spend a great deal of their time “overcoming objections” from their customers they are really positioning themselves for conflict with their customers. To paraphrase noted consultant and trainer Jeff Thull, even polite disagreements and respectful differences of opinion create negative dynamics with your customers. At worst, it turns the savings process into a battle which the supply chain professional must somehow conquer the customer to win the argument. If this too has been your experience it is time for a “reality check”, because no matter how genteel and polite the dialogs are with your customers, if there is conflict of any kind, the final result of these exchanges is that your relationship has become adversarial. Three Adversarial Traps There are three adversarial traps that you must avoid if you are to move from demanding to collaborating with your customers to bring about quality savings results: 1. Depending on your customer’s decision-making processes to produce quality decisions and outcomes Customers aren’t used to making complex product, service and technology purchasing decisions, so if left to their own devices they will take the easiest route in making decisions, thus, leaving out key elements of a quality decision making process! 2. Assuming that your customers understand their own problems and can evaluate all solutions available to them Customers only see one-tenth of their supply chain iceberg, so how can you expect them to understand their own problems, or, due to time constraints, even seriously consider more than one solution that is available to them. 3. Believing that your skills in presenting, persuading and convincing will win most battles and even a few all out wars The current strategies of presenting, persuading and convincing customers to change only creates frustration, misunderstandings and conflicts, because it still leaves your customers with the same fears, biases, and concerns they came in the door with. All of the above traps that we have been discussing are really “systemic problems” formed by the lack of a proven, repeatable approach for our customers to make quality decisions about their product, service and technology purchases. Quality Decisions Come From Quality Systems If you want to collaborate with your customers so that they can bring about quality savings results, then you first need your own quality decision making savings systems to replace your customer’s decision making systems that haven’t resulted in making quality decisions or outcomes in the past. You Either Have Your Own Decision System or You We Be At The Mercy Of Someone Else’s Decision System! If you are looking for quality savings results from your customers, I would strongly recommend that you license, buy, steal or develop your own quality decision savings system for the purchasing of the millions of dollars in products, services and technologies you purchase annually. Otherwise, I can guarantee you that you will be at the mercy of someone else’s untrustworthy decision making system that has proven itself unreliable in making good quality decisions for your healthcare organization over the years. About the Author Robert T. Yokl, President, The HCP Group, Ltd., has over 35 years of experience as a consultant and manager in the field of Supply Value Chain Management and is one of the country's leading healthcare experts in value analysis, value engineering, Non Salary Expense Reduction and materials management. He is the developer and program leader of the award winning Certified Value Analysis Practitioner Training Program™. Mr. Yokl is also the developer of the healthcare industry's leading ValueNetCentral™ Value Analysis Software. Over the past two decades he has trained thousands of healthcare managers in his patented Strategic Value Analysis™ and Team-Based Project Management™ processes and has assisted scores of organizations in developing their own value management programs. He has published six books, videos and audios on supply/value chain management. His latest book being, “ Strategic Value Analysis™: The #1 Smart Strategy for Taking Cost Out of a Healthcare Organizations’ Healthcare Supply Value Chain”. _____________________________________________________________ COPYRIGHT 2004 - THE HCP GROUP, LTD. - ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

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