Grassroots Quality Improvement through the My Bright Idea Program

A great idea can come from any employee.

That’s the simple ethos behind the My Bright Idea (MBI) program at Planned Parenthood Great Northwest, Hawai’i, Alaska, Indiana, Kentucky (PPGNHAIK), a Title X grantee network.

MBI is an internal program that fosters equitable opportunities for employees at all levels to have their thoughts and suggestions heard. The program’s leaders—Allison Moroni, Quality Program Administrator, and Katie Aguilar, Director of Quality and Risk Management—have set up an inclusive, systematic approach for collecting, reviewing, and testing ideas and solutions from all PPGNHAIK staff:

• Staff can submit suggestions anytime through PPGNHAIK’s SharePoint site.
• An interdisciplinary workgroup meets every two months to review the ideas. The workgroup includes staff from clinical services, clinical operations, quality and risk management, training, revenue cycle operations, and information services. They consult subject matter experts from other departments, as needed. 
• The workgroup uses a continuous improvement lens. They consider multiple factors when deciding whether to pursue an idea, including: Will it enable us to better serve our communities and enhance the patient experience?  Will it improve employee morale across departments? Will the idea have a financial impact, e.g., generate revenue or cut costs?

MBI fits nicely into PPGNHAIK’s ongoing continuous quality improvement efforts. In fact, MBI is itself a product of PPGNHAIK’s openness to innovation and iteration; they established the program in 2020 in response to feedback on an employee engagement survey. 

In the first quarter of 2024 alone, PPGNHAIK received 20 bright ideas. So far, the team has implemented eight of these, including: adding missing information to patient education sheets, providing $100 toward lunch for clinics meeting monthly well-visit metrics, and putting up clinic signs that say, “Attacking a health care worker is a felony,” to make staff feel safer.

And the ideas keep coming. Recently, an employee noticed that, when clients were coming in to get an IUD or implant, their health center was only charging for the procedure, not an office visit. After looking into it, PPGNHAIK’s revenue cycle team determined they can bill for an office visit too. They hope to see an increase in revenue as a result.

If your agency isn’t already doing so, think about gathering regular feedback from your own staff. Our Staff Satisfaction Survey and Tips for Measuring Impact and Staff Satisfaction can help you get started.