by Tim Coomer, Specific Software
Part 4 of the series “The Power of Intentionality”: Part 3
Those of you who are regular readers know that my early career was spent as a systems analyst in the defense industry. If you’ll bear with me mentioning it again, that job taught me something that applies to today’s blog: focusing on one piece of a large, complex system can easily lead to weakness in other parts of the system. And, elements that will challenge a system – such as ballistic missiles – will find the weak parts of the system and potentially take advantage of them.
Is your work comp focus too narrow?
With work comp being as big and complex as it is, it hardly feels like I left defense systems. Many of the same principles apply, and here’s the principal weakness I see with how employers try to manage work comp: During the past several decades, employers and the risk management industry have focused on safety as the ultimate solution to lower workers compensation costs. But despite the tremendous effort put into safety training – and the significant gains in work place safety – many employers still struggle with workers compensation losses as a significant and often unpredictable expense.
- hiring someone with a medical history that comes back to bite you
- having the attitude that accidents are inevitable
- assuming that human resource and medical personnel communicating with an injured employee is enough
- not understanding how important it is to get an employee back to work, even if on modified duty
- being satisfied with a mod of 1.0
- buying work comp insurance with a “low bid” mentality
- and so much more!
Editor’s note: I’m here to confirm that Tim really can juggle, although as far as I know, he’s exaggerating about the flaming sword routine. However, if you talk to him, ask him about his unicycle!
The principles of juggling apply to managing many components of a big system such as work comp:
- You have to touch each object on a regular basis. In other words, you can’t focus just on safety, or just on return-to-work, or just on the mod. There are 15 WorkCompEdge modules, and eventually, you should be using all or most of them.
- You have to manage your speed. For example, this is why we recommend quarterly reviews of data in the Verify Your Mod module and workbook. This is why your actions in the first 24 hours following an injury are so important.
- You have to manage your accuracy. If your payroll isn’t classified correctly, you may be paying too much in premiums. If your losses aren’t classified as medical-only when applicable, your mod may be much higher than you deserve. If claims aren’t closed in a timely way, it can affect your mod. These are just a few examples.
- The right kind of object will make juggling easier. You don’t start out juggling flaming swords (I’ll post the YouTube video of me doing that soon.) The right tools and automation are going to help you maximize your success. Enough said!
- Starting with a small number of objects is easier. This is why we have our Getting Started quiz, to help you prioritize which issues you should consider first.
- Of course, you get better – and can juggle more – with practice. This is why module after module in WorkCompEdge urges you to come back and reassess on a regular basis.
- And finally, at any given time, you have to have a mind’s eye view of where each object is. As you practice more, you develop this ability – and even an intuition – that helps you continue to improve.
http://www.SpecificSoftware.com
http://www.WorkCompEdge.com
Prior to my career in defense, I fueled planes at an airport, where there would sometimes be fairly long delays between flights destined for our terminal. During the downtime, I taught myself to juggle. I still keep beanbags in my office to entertain and relax myself (and to challenge our blog editor Kory Wells, who has yet to get the hang of it).
Filed under: General
