Anna's Blog

 Posts Tagged ‘Gold Star Standard’

I knew the experience would be awesome…I didn’t have any idea HOW awesome. What am I talking about???…well, I was invited to attend a celebratory luncheon today called, “That was Then…This is Now”, hosted by Mesa Developmental Services, to recognize the efforts of all of the agency departments in utilizing Therap to get the company paperless in only 12 months.

It should be no surprise why I have selected Mesa Developmental Services as the first, of many agencies, that will be highlighted in my new blog series – “My Gold Star Standard of Therap Excellence.”

It is my hope that agencies across the nation will use what others have found successful as a template for their own organization or just pieces of their story to get over a barrier that might be preventing them from full implementation.

What MDS has done is nothing short of incredible and I would not have missed this celebration for anything. I just had to be there to talk to the staff and the leadership team about HOW they got this accomplished.

The process didn’t come without a little bit of pain. As Jeff Nichols, CEO at Mesa Developmental Services (as well as a Leadership Institute colleague of mine) would tell, it started with one philosophy, “get on the bus…or get off”.

Jeff had a vision of what he wanted technology to do for his agency and he set the wheels in motion to get it done. Believe it or not, his team was good with where that bus was headed and they stayed on, developing processes, training all levels of staff, and continuing to remain committed months after the initial training in order to keep the wheels of the Therap bus moving.

Two of the team members that have been very instrumental in the process are John Klausz and Sherry Price. Along with a Therap committee that meets twice a month, these fantastic Therapites are a part of the energy that keeps the agency moving forward with deadlines and implementation plans for new Therap applications, working with departments to test pilot new functions, incorporating families and guardians into the Therap information process, and providing feedback to the leadership team about the progress of the system across the organization.

It’s no small undertaking, MDS is a company with nearly 400 employees and more than 500 individuals with developmental disabilities….and they made paperless happen in one year!

Here are a few highlights from today’s event:

“Behaviors have gone down significantly due to increased information and consistency in the approach.” –Patty

“With Therap, the time response is so much better. It used to take 1-2 weeks to resolve an incident…now it can be taken care of almost immediately.” – Michelle

“Its FEAR that holds people back. You just have to jump off the cliff and do it”.   – John

“You need risk takers within the ranks that aren’t afraid to just try and investigate…then they just do it.” – Sherry

“Therap makes staff accountable for their own documentation. We don’t have people saying they were left out of the loop. If they do, it’s their own fault…all of the information is there.” – Sherry

“There are very few things that can’t fit into Therap in our industry.” – Jeff