Shared Governance

Shared Governance is a system of accountability for Cottage Health that establishes a positive staff/management partnership leading to a meaningful, respectful and creative work environment dedicated to meeting the healthcare needs of all we serve.

Coordinating Council

You will notice our core values of Excellence, Integrity and Compassion within the circle. This is to remind us that everything we do must increase value to the patient. The Coordinating Council is made up of 24 people that represent the functional areas of the entire system. The Coordinating Council has three roles.

First to work with our OPS group; which is made up of all the Cottage Health Vice Presidents discussing the operations of the system. As ideas come forward for process improvement we ensure that everyone is aware of direction and ideas.

Another role of the Coordinating Council is to work with Unit / Department / Service councils. These are groups formed at the department level to work on process improvement that effects their department.

Lastly, the Coordinating Council forms Task Teams as needed as issues arise that may be more than one department. These come to light via the work that the Coordinating Council members are doing with the departments or via Voice Forms.

Voice Forms

Voice forms are one way for any staff member to invite the organization to explore ideas to change. It is an online system where employees answer three questions: What is the issue? What would resolution look like to you? What have you done about it so far?

Each voice form is triaged and routed to appropriate people to get resolutions: The manager of that employee to ensure that they are aware of the idea; Someone in the organization that might be able to move that idea forward or provide thoughts and concerns about the idea; The Coordinating Council to review all voice forms and ensure that they are being worked on and closed; and our Vice President Operations group.

All ideas result in employees feeling they are heard and having a vehicle to let someone know that they noticed something. 75% of all voice forms result in some form of change.