The Power of The Team

“With an enthusiastic team you can achieve almost anything.” - Tahir Shah

My good friend, Steve Labens, down in Baton Rouge, has a scrap of paper and two tickets framed on the wall in his den.  The scrap of paper says: “If Nick Saben stays, LSU National Champs in 2004.”  The unusual thing is that Steve wrote that prediction 4 years earlier, in 2000, sitting in his truck at Tiger Stadium after a game.  The two tickets are from the National Championship game in 2003. 

                                           

Nick Saben had a vision.  When Saben interviewed with LSU in November 1999 for the head coach position, he told them that LSU would win the SEC Championship within 3 years and compete for the National Championship shortly thereafter.  He had a 5-year plan to accomplish those goals.  He executed the plan and achieved the vision, even a little ahead of schedule. The LSU Tigers became the #1 team in college football in 2003, something that had not happened since 1958.  It shows the power of a vision supported by an enthusiastic team.

And I see the same spirit at my current hospital, The Bradley Center.  In 2011, we developed a strategic plan to grow the census from the existing average of 24 patients a day, expand our patient base and return The Bradley Center to profitability after 7 years of losses.  And the signs of our success are everywhere:  Census has grown to an average of 70 patients a day, TBC is profitable for the first time since 2007, and quality & patient satisfaction are improving.  Our Crisis Stabilization Unit is showcased by the Department of Behavioral Health and Developmental Disabilities as “the best such program in the state of Georgia” and the CSU team recently received the first ever Team Daisy Award.  But there’s much left to do:  Sustain the improvements in quality and patient satisfaction, relocate & expand our geropsychiatric program, revision our current CBHU into a dedicated Psychiatric Intensive Care unit, relocate & expand our psychiatrists’ outpatient clinic and probably a dozen other challenges we haven’t even envisioned yet.   

And I remain confident because, as Tahir Shah says:  “With an enthusiastic team you can achieve almost anything.”  ~  Bob Prehn, Administrative Director