Dr. Lisa Yerian discusses lessons learned from building a culture of empowerment and continuous improvement at the Cleveland Clinic. She emphasizes the importance of anchoring transformation efforts in a clear purpose, critically reflecting on progress, and solving problems with empathy. Yerian explains how the Clinic focused the purpose on empowering every caregiver to make improvements. They reflected on whether transformations truly served this purpose. Solutions were approached with empathy, understanding different perspectives rather than judgment. The goal was to connect with others and help the Clinic work as a team to follow their shared purpose of improving patient care.

1. Building a Culture of
Empowerment:
Reflections on
Lessons Learned
Hosted by
Host: Mark Graban
Senior Advisor, KaiNexus
Mark@KaiNexus.com
Presenter: Dr. Lisa Yerian
Chief Improvement Officer
Cleveland Clinic
YERIANL@ccf.org

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3. About Dr. Lisa Yerian
• Cleveland Clinic:
• Chief Improvement Officer
• Hepatobiliary Pathologist
• Team has engaged over 40,000 Cleveland Clinic
caregivers in improvement
• Authored over 150 manuscripts, articles, and
book chapters
• Board of Directors:
• Lean Enterprise Institute
• Catalysis
• B.S., The University of Notre Dame
• University of Chicago-Pritzker School of Medicine

4. Lisa Yerian, MD
Chief Improvement Officer
Cleveland Clinic
Building a culture of
empowerment: reflections on
lessons learned

5. A broken
system

6. 42
Million
1 in 5

7. Burnout is
rampant
Anxiety
Depression
Post-traumatic stress
Suicidal ideation

8. What about
improvement?
Operational
excellence
CI / Continuous
improvement
TPS
Lean
SixSigma
Agile
Design thinking
Etc., etc.

9. What about
improvement?
Operational
excellence
CI / Continuous
improvement
TPS
Lean
SixSigma
Agile
Design thinking
Etc., etc.

10. … we won’t worry about the little mistakes
in the record. It’s [about] how they feel
when the record stops playing.
Do they want to play it again?
- Sam Phillips, 1923-2003

11. Anchor in
purpose
Reflect with
integrity
Solve with
empathy

12. Anchor in
purpose
Reflect with
integrity
Solve with
empathy
Anchor in
purpose
Reflect with
integrity
Solve with
empathy

13. Anchor in
purpose
Reflect with
integrity
Solve with
empathy
Anchor in
purpose
Reflect with
integrity
Solve with
empathy
Do they want to play it again?

14. Anchoring in
purpose

15. “Build a culture
of improvement” ?

16. No Map

17. No Map
No Mandate

18. No Map
No Mandate
One Chance

19. Elsewhere Cleveland

20. What is the purpose of
your transformation?
- Nate Hurle, 1974-2021

22. “Sounds like you need to do an A3!”

24. How do we
help each
other find and
follow the
path?

25. “Culture of
Improvement”
every caregiver
capable,
empowered
and expected
to make
improvements
every day

26. Reflect with
integrity

27. “My improvement
team told me to”
“What is the
purpose?”

29. How do we reflect critically on our
transformation?

30. Solve with
empathy

31. “... we all have
the ability to
impact … and
make a
difference”

33. Judging
Annoyance
Frustration
Victimhood
Sympathy
Empathy is not

34. Making the
vulnerable choice
to connect with a
person – by
connecting with
something in myself
that knows that
feeling
- Brenē Brown

35. What do YOU
connect with –
to go into the
pit?

38. Do they want to play it again?

39. access to

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How To Design Organizational Habits That
Propagate a Culture of Continuous
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Greg Jacobson, MD & Morgan Wright

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Host: Mark Graban
Senior Advisor, KaiNexus
Mark@KaiNexus.com
Presenter:
Dr. Lisa Yerian
Chief Improvement Officer
Cleveland Clinic
YERIANL@ccf.org