Tapping into intrinsic motivation is key to driving change, but how do you do it? The following excerpt from the IHI Psychology of Change Framework to Advance and Sustain Improvement white paper explores the role of intrinsic motivation in improvement and how to release it. Tapping into their fundamental reasons - or intrinsic motivations - for wanting to continuously improve patient care helped them develop more effective collaboration and increased joy in work. This opened the door to honest conversations about daily challenges and willingness to test systemic improvements. Learning that they shared much in common (including their commitment to their patients) led to greater camaraderie. As part of a strategy to change this, Beach asked the team what mattered to them and why they chose health care as a profession.
Staff engagement in the cardiovascular intensive care unit (CICU) scored in the bottom tier for two consecutive years, and most team members agreed that their multidisciplinary collaboration needed work. Jamie Beach, Quality Data Manager at the University of Michigan Frankel Cardiovascular Center, had a problem.