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A Strategic Approach to Compliance Training: KnowledgeQ®
The Q1 2016 Healthcare Workforce Advisoris focused squarely on nursing and the nursing role across the care continuum. This post excerpts an article about using data to manage annual training requirements by David Rosenthal, Vice President, Business Development at HCCS, A HealthStream Company.
Can you confidently say that your training initiatives are effective, that your employees are well trained, and that patients are safe? Do you have reliable data that allows you to strategically deploy training and manage your training costs? Are you prepared for your next audit? KnowledgeQ® is HealthStream’s answer to the healthcare industry’s demand for a strategic approach to annual mandatory training. The stakes are too high to continue a “check-the-box” exercise that offers almost no visibility into the cost of delivering training and whether expenditures could be eliminated or redirected to more effective initiatives.
As the industry leader in mandatory training, we have developed a solution that allows healthcare leaders to better manage their annual training initiatives by creating tools to help them identify knowledge gaps in their workforce. In addition, the solution would need to contribute to the broader financial health of the organization. With 2 – 3 % operating margins, healthcare organizations are increasingly challenged to do more with less. That is why we set out to develop an approach to annual mandatory training that optimizes efficiency and enhances staff’s effectiveness in providing the safest and best care.
Set Your Regulatory Training Goals
The starting point with an effective compliance training program begins with knowing your current status. With KnowledgeQ®, it is not necessary to wait on an email with multiple Excel attachments from another department in your organization. You are armed with instant access to your compliance readiness—along all of the dimensions and details that you need to effectively manage your program to success. Through a completion report that shows progress on all training assignments, you can check compliance training progress by state, region, job title, role, and much more. Importantly, you can set and manage goals for each of the five training categories, as well as your overall readiness score. With KnowledgeQ®, your progress is automatically tracked and visually available to evaluate and use in collaboration with others.
Compare your progress against 18 million test results
The way to intelligently assess the effectiveness of your compliance training program is through data. KnowledgeQ® is unique in that it offers comparisons to HealthStream’s extensive national benchmarks. KnowledgeQ® is the first and only source in the healthcare industry where you can instantly compare the progress of your workforce relative to other organizations. The availability of benchmarks allows you to assess the effectiveness of your program, basing your conclusions on facts, not assumptions. Moreover, KnowledgeQ’s national benchmarks allow you to learn how the best organizations are achieving their results. Measuring training completion rates is clearly important, but the real measure of success lies with the safety and patient care knowledge gained by the workforce. KnowledgeQ includes a composite knowledge score of the accreditation-aligned categories of environmental care, human resources, life safety, provision of care, and infection prevention and control. National benchmarks are provided that inform you of your workforce’s knowledge in these areas and how they compare to national norms.
Cut Costs, Save Time, & Collaborate
Compliance training is a mandatory expense. KnowledgeQ® provides powerful data that informs you of a realistic estimate of the actual cost of your program—and how you can achieve the same or greater effectiveness while managing the budget. The cost of your compliance training program extends beyond the purchase of software and content. For the first time in the industry, KnowledgeQ® allows you to understand and accurately measure the amount of time your staff is completing coursework and the estimated costs of this program to your organization. Labor rate data from the Bureau of Labor and Statistics is built in. You’ll be able to determine the true costs of your training program and compare your costs to other healthcare organizations.