By David M. Williams, PhD Photo: Marco Verch Happy New Year! The transition from one year to the next always feels like a great time to reset. The end of the year can be hectic as you wrap up work — preparing for the holidays and travel just add to the stress. For our house, […]

Anyone who has worked with me has likely experienced my efforts to find some great file I want to share and then watch me struggle to easily retrieve it off my MacBook Air. As process focused as I am, I have been laxed in developing a good system for electronic file folder and file naming […]

It is Not the Critic It is not the critic who counts, nor the man who points out how the strong man stumbled, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and […]

ESO Solutions is an Austin-based software as a service company serving the public safety community. The company started with an electronic medical record for ambulance service, but has grown to include fire service reporting, health data exchange, and a host of administrative data and reporting management solutions. ESO Solutions grew rapidly in the ambulance EMR […]

Mecklenburg EMS Agency (MEDIC) is the Emergency Medical Services provider for the Charlotte-Mecklenburg, NC metropolitan area. The executive director, Joe Penner, is a longtime student of improvement science and regularly attends the Institute for Healthcare Improvement National Forum and is a certified Improvement Advisor through IHI’s professional development program. Joe studied Dr. Deming’s concept of […]

Over the last year or so, we’ve seen a rapid emergence of the use of social media like Facebook and Twitter. We’ve also seen it become an interesting communication tool for businesses and real people to share ideas and information. It feels as if we are only beginning to see the potential of these relatively […]

  I recently returned from the Pinnacle EMS Forum, which is the leading conference for leaders of prehospital emergency medical transport services (i.e., paramedics). The keynote speaker was my friend Robert Lloyd, PhD, executive director of performance improvement for the Institute for Healthcare Improvement. Dr. Lloyd led fantastic plenary and breakout sessions presenting a pragmatic […]

Ding! “Flight Attendants take your seats,” came the announcement from the cockpit. As one who flies quite a bit, this is nothing unusual – maybe some unexpected turbulence. Maybe not! The flight attendant in the front reached into an overhead compartment, grabbed an oxygen cylinder, and darted to her seat behind the partition. Her colleague […]

  In December 2008, I sat in the audience as surgeon, researcher, and author Atul Gawande, MD previewed some exciting research he had contributed to. The results, at the time, were pending and due to be published in early 2009 in the New England Journal of Medicine.    We all have heard stories of medical […]

Peoria (IL) "International" Airport Terminal Photo taken by David M. Williams' iPhone. I have long been an advocate of client or customer centered service. Regardless of your organizational model (e.g., not-for-profit) or if you deliver a service or sell a product, we all have customers. Unfortunately, many people and organizations never engage the people they serve […]