Caring for the Caregivers: Southcentral Foundation’s Relationship-Based Workforce Strategies

Background: Health care systems around the world are facing challenges related to supporting the workforce, addressing high turnover rates, and preventing burnout. Southcentral Foundation (SCF) is an Alaska Native customer-owned health care system responsible for providing health care and related services to approximately 70,000 Alaska Native and American Indian people in Alaska’s Cook Inlet region. SCF operates the Nuka System of Care, designed and built by the people it serves, in which Integrated Care Teams form strong, long-term relationships with patients (who are called “customer-owners” at SCF) to better support them in achieving wellness.

To support this, SCF provides the Core Concepts training for all its employees, which teaches the communication skills team members need to understand each customer-owner’s unique story and health needs and goals, and to support each other in avoiding burnout.

Audience:This session will be valuable for senior leaders, clinical managers, medical directors, medical and behavioral clinicians, workforce development staff, and anyone else with an interest in a training about communication and relationship-building skills that are used to support workforce wellness, resiliency, and satisfaction. Attendees will learn about the core elements of SCF’s Core Concepts training, how SCF developed the training in partnership with the Alaska Native community, and how the training has been woven throughout SCF.

Approach: This workshop will be taught in an interactive lecture format. Participants will be divided into small Learning Circles (which are used in SCF’s Core Concepts training), and the presenters will provide regular opportunities for the circles to discuss the material presented. Afterward, the small groups will report out to the larger group so that a variety of perspectives can be shared. Slightly over half of the workshop time will be devoted to the group discussions, and the presenters will facilitate the sharing of information and ideas among attendees.

Outcomes:Attendees will learn about the history of SCF’s Core Concepts training, and the major elements of it, including:

• How learning to share and respond to story allows health care providers to more effectively support customer-owners as well as support each other and reduce employee burnout
• Various communication tools, including:

oThe Ladder of Inference (which discusses how we can jump to conclusions, and how to avoid doing so)

oLeft-hand column (which teaches healthy methods for sharing one’s feelings on potentially delicate subjects)

oRelational styles (which teaches participants how to understand their preferred communication and relational styles)

oThe four-player model (which teaches participants how to understand their approach to work and how to make valuable contributions to a team)

• How to apply the lessons from the training to develop stronger relationships in the workplace and a more positive, collaborative and productive work environment.

Attendees will also learn how SCF uses Core Concepts throughout the organization, and how it has helped SCF achieve improved health outcomes through relationship-based care, including reduced Emergency Department visits and hospital stays for customer-owners, improved results on health benchmarks, and high customer and employee satisfaction rates (98% and 90% respectively).