As we travel throughout the Kaiser Permanente regions we always leave with a question still unanswered: What changes someone’s thinking?

Behind that question are a multitude of others:

• If you are a member of a successful unit-based team, did you and your team members have to change the way you thought about your work?
• If you are a member of a team that is struggling, is it because you or others on your team haven’t been able to change the way you think? 
• Do you have a supervisor that continues to dominate the discussion in staff meetings, takes control of every situation, and forgets to ask for input from the team?
• Do you have a union steward that reacts defensively to every problem, is suspicious of management’s intentions, and feels the best use of Partnership is to hold it hostage until he or she gets what they want?

Or,

• Have your co-workers and managers decided there has to be a better way? 
• Have they figured out that something has to change? 
• Do they know what that something is?

UBTs: A platform for change

There has been a multitude of expert consultants who have taught their particular style of change to Kaiser over the years. Some were very successful, others were not as valuable. When all was said and done, not a whole lot changed. Then in 2007, something happened. Kaiser Permanente and the Union Coalition agreed that something had to be done and done quickly, and that it might be the answer to how we solve our problems. It might be the answer to how we see each other as members of a huge organization and as members of a huge Coalition. It might be the answer to the health care facing a nation in need of answers. It just might be.

In 2007, Unit Based Teams were launched and a goal was set to reach one hundred percent of represented staff participating in teams by the end of 2010. And guess what time it is?  It’s time to get to work. It’s time for the teams to blossom. It’s time to make Kaiser Permanente the best place to receive care and the best place to work. But none of this will be possible without teams.  Unit-based teams. And that requires change. What changes thinking? You do.