Janitorial quality control is always important, but the stakes are unusually high for hospitals and healthcare facilities. As Renee Kavanagh (Environmental Services Coordinator for Mary Rutan Hospital in Ohio) says, it all comes down to safety.
“Working in a hospital environment, obviously we deal with infectious things,” she says. “Our key focus is to make sure our workplace is safe.” That’s not just for patients, but for the doctors, staff, visitors—and everyone else who walks through the door.
So how can hospital janitorial teams make sure they get it right? Quality control is a huge part of the answer because it affects everything else: staff training, team communication, early identification of problems, and more. The right software empowers janitorial teams working in healthcare to stay on top of all these details.
Kavanagh’s team at Mary Rutan Hospital uses OrangeQC, and she gave us an inside perspective on how using our app and software helps them meet their quality goals.
1. It makes it easier to get inspections done.
The best inspections are the ones that actually get done. Having great janitorial quality control software in place makes this a lot easier for busy janitorial teams.
Before they started using OrangeQC for inspections, Kavanagh’s team relied on paper checklists. Now, she appreciates the easier alternative. “The program is loaded onto our iPads, so we can take it anywhere we go,” she says. “We don’t have a stack of papers to track, and the inspection goes into the cloud so we can access the information anywhere.”
As an added bonus, Kavanagh can see which areas have been inspected recently (and which haven’t) at a glance, which helps her prioritize inspections for the day.
Even as a self-proclaimed “non-techy” person, Kavanagh says the OrangeQC app has lightened her workload. “It’s just so simple to use . . . It’s made my job a lot easier, for sure.”
2. It helps with training (and retraining) team members.
Kavanagh uses the inspection data for two kinds of staff training.
First, she looks at results on an individual level. “I can track issues with specific employees to know their weaknesses and things that they need to improve on,” she says. “That’s really beneficial when it comes to new employees.” Seasoned employees can also get into a routine where “they clean what they clean,” she says, and regular inspections help her give feedback on what they may be missing.
Secondly, she tracks staff-wide issues that keep cropping up. “We zero in on a problem area—say, baseboards—and that is our problem for the month,” she says. Staff members who get high inspection scores for that area get entered into a drawing for a gift card prize. It’s a fun way to get everyone on the same page about quality expectations.
3. It facilitates better communication.
Kavanagh’s department sets goals for the year, then uses OrangeQC to measure whether or not their performance is on track for them to hit the goal. Everyone stays up-to-date with automatic emails from OrangeQC that report scores and issues. That allows the department’s director to keep his focus on big-picture issues, like budgets and managing multiple facilities, while still staying informed about inspections and quality control at each location. If he notices a particularly low score, he can follow up with the right coordinator to address the problem.
Kavanagh also appreciates getting inspection scores sent to her email each day, which helps her stay on top of any drops. If she notices a dip in inspection scores, she makes a point to connect with the right team member the next day.
For janitorial teams at hospitals and healthcare facilities, quality control is paramount. The safety of patients, staff, and visitors depends on it. That’s why it’s important for teams to have the right tools to help them succeed. We believe great quality control software is a huge part of that.
For more information on how OrangeQC helps hospital and healthcare teams meet their goals, check out more information on our solutions for hospitals and healthcare or request a one-on-one demo to see how our software works for yourself.
