There’s no doubt one of the most significant challenges any service organization faces is how to sustain excellence in service delivery over long periods of time.  After all, service organizations live or die based on the passion and commitment of the people providing the service.  Once the passion goes, the service trends to the ordinary. Or worse.

Continuing my social anthropological work while immersed in Mayo, I had an opportunity to chat informally with a nursing student serving as an assistant here as part of her education.  Her comments speak volumes about Mayo’s approach to passing along that pride and passion from generation to generation of service providers.

She grew up in the area around Rochester, MN, and when I asked her directly what it was like to be training and eventually working here, she offered (I paraphrase):

When you grow up around here, you just come to expect Mayo as the “normal” in healthcare.  It’s not until you go to school somewhere else and then come in here and start listening to the patients and their stores that you begin to realize this is some place truly special.

Me: How does Mayo work with younger professionals like you to help build that sense of pride that is so evident?

Her: Really, it’s working with the patients and then working with the people that have been here for a long time. You learn very quickly about how much patients from around the world value being here.  And you learn very quickly from the staff what a privilege it is to work here.

The Bottom-Line for Now:

I’ll end at, “What a privilege it is to work here.” Think about that. How many people do you know who view their employers through that filter? Those that do are the fortunate ones. And for those of you leading others, how do your people feel about working for you and your team? If it’s something short of “privilege,” you’ve got a few decades worth of work to do.