Published in the Independence Daily Reporter December 2018

Rural hospitals across America have had a tough time over the last few years. Increasing health care costs and shrinking reimbursements from insurance companies and government health programs have really put the squeeze on operating budgets. Some hospitals have closed, as we know only too well in Southeast Kansas. (BTW, health care cost increases pale in comparison to the rising cost of higher education and college related debt, but that’s a subject for another time.)

The large research hospitals and institutions, are working to cure society’s most serious ills; cancer, Alzheimers, etc. and this is good. However, few medical organizations, from hospitals to medical clinics and offices, are working on innovation in the patient experience. Rural hospitals and clinics are in a battle with each other to lure patients to use their services to keep volumes and hospital census figures at higher levels to maintain their viability through continued uncertainty in the way our society chooses to pay for health care.

The marketing campaigns tend to center on themes like “our doctors are better than your doctors” or “we have the latest equipment to cure your ills” or “look at this latest award we won or certification we received.” The implication is that “we will take care of you.” Yet many of our visits to these institutions and clinics result in experiences that range from mediocre to awful.

I’ve been in good health my whole life and remain so now even though I’ve encountered our health care system on numerous occasions over the last few years starting with a hip replacement in November 2015. That surgery went very well and, in fact, the surgeon is my hero; great job on the surgery and a good, friendly individual. Since then, on other issues, I’ve been to ER a couple of times and various hospitals and doctors’ offices not only locally, but in Bartlesville and Tulsa. Through it all, the doctors have been nice enough and competent. Indeed, most of the people doing the work are dedicated and hard-working. This is a world where with each visit, we may have to show our insurance cards and repeat our contact information, even when only a week apart. We may wait 45 minutes for the call to the exam room and another 45 minutes from the time the nurse determines our heart rate and blood pressure to the time the doctor comes through the door. We may call to update a prescription to hear a message telling us to leave our name and number and that “we’ll get back with you within 24 hours.” We’re admonished not to call back as that will only slow the process. Twenty-four hours may pass and we don’t hear back even if the prescription is an important one.

My comments here are not directed at any one institution nor are they directed at most of the clinical people involved. We are all victims of a health care system that lacks an entrepreneurial mindset in providing not only the best in health care, but also providing a positive, even exceptional patient/customer experience. Marketers are in a tough position as they work hard to attract more patient/customers only to have those patients experience mediocre to awful service.

We at Fab Lab ICC, have on our drawing board, plans to offer in 2019 a series of one-day leadership retreats for the people managing our clinical organizations where we introduce an entrepreneurial mindset around the theme of “here’s what your patients really want.” We’ll work to make these retreats both a team and patient relationship building experience. Of course, making something in the Lab will be part of the experience.

Small retailers are learning that the way to compete for repeat customers in a world of box stores and Internet sales is to provide a positive experience each and every time they encounter a customer. Service providers in all clinical disciplines should understand that the best way to complete for patients and clients is to provide and exceptional experience as well as expert clinical care.

 

Jim Correll is the director of Fab Lab ICC at the Center for Innovation and Entrepreneurship on the campus of Independence Community College. He can be reached at (620) 252-5349, by email at jcorrell@indycc.edu or Twitter @jimcorrellks.

 

Published in the Independence Daily Reporter November 2018

Like the perennial “It’s a Wonderful Life” I’ve decided to make this one a Christmas tradition.

When I was growing up, let’s just say it was several years ago, battery operated toys were just coming into existence. In those days, batteries (technically, energy cells) were expensive enough that most electric toys were sold without them. Hence, the phrase we still sometimes hear today “Batteries not included.” It was kind of a sign that you were up-to-date with technology if you got something for Christmas that required batteries. Parents wanted to give their kids the latest so why give those boring, non-electric gifts like Tinker Toys, Lincoln Logs or erector sets when the kids wanted the electric toys that had lights, bells and the ability to move around on their own through simple electric motors?

One of my favorites from my era was a “robot” similar to those appearing in movies and shows like “Lost in Space.” Also, at that time, the “Jetson’s” animated cartoon show sported “Rosie” the robot maid. Although hokey by today’s standards, we didn’t know of anything else so the robot that would merely light up and move around the floor was as exciting to us as the more sophisticated cool robots of today. That early robot didn’t teach me much, except how to insert the batteries in the right direction but it was a cool toy. Fortunately for me, I kept on playing with the Tinker Toys, Lincoln Logs and my erector set.

The trend to electric and now electronic toys has continued over the last 50 years–admittedly, with some really cool technology always emerging. This keeps parents wanting to make sure their kids have the latest electronic gadgets. Unfortunately, this trend has contributed to two or three generations of folks who, by and large, don’t know how to make things with their hands. Actually, many don’t try to make anything with their hands or fix anything around the house as they lack the imagination inspired by playing with hands-on toys that required tinkering and making.

We see this all the time at Fab Lab ICC with people of all ages that are not very adept at using their hands. In the first year we were open, 2014, one of our ICC students was a wizard at creating complex 3d drawings in using a computer program, but he couldn’t make anything with his hands. He didn’t know a Philips from a flat-head screwdriver. He moved on before we could give him much experience at using hand tools and making things and will be at a disadvantage in his professional and personal life.

Over the last few years, when we bring kids to Fab Lab ICC for maker boot camps and other activities, we make sure there’s plenty of working with hand tools mixed in with the digital work of creating files that run the cool fabrication machines. Here’s the thing. The kids love making things with their hands as much as making digital files on the computer.

The most successful people in the future at work, at home and in business—and the future is now–are those who will make things using drills, screwdrivers and hammers combined with the latest digital technology. Even those in a non-maker profession will be better at solving work-related problems because of their ability to create and make.

I’m not really advocating a totally battery-free Christmas, however, the toys we give, and the activities we provide for our kids (of all ages) need to be a combination of the cool technology along with some hand-work with manual hand tools. The learning and increase in self-confidence that happens with this combination is phenomenal and very satisfying for the gift giver to observe.

 

Jim Correll is the director of Fab Lab ICC at the Center for Innovation and Entrepreneurship on the campus of Independence Community College. He can be reached at (620) 252-5349, by email at jcorrell@indycc.edu or Twitter @jimcorrellks.

 

Jim Correll, director Fab Lab ICC at Independence Community College, Independence Kansas

I’m not an avid student of economic theory. Indeed, few of the topics that ever come up among the entrepreneurs, students and members using Fab Lab ICC have anything to do with micro or macroeconomics; economic theory.

However, scarcity is an essential principle of economic sustainability. … As something becomes less scarce, it has less economic value. On the surface, the concept of scarcity is understood intrinsically by entrepreneurs and small business owners. If you’re selling something that is not readily available, it has more value than something that is abundant everywhere. New products come to market to solve problems. Bringing a new product to the marketplace is much easier if there are not already solutions readily available. New solutions have to be unique, i.e. scarce to have value. Tim Voegeli, Tubeless Solutions, Wichita, Kansas, said it best during one of his visits while prototyping a new bicycle tool at our Lab. “If it’s not unique, why bother.”

Some items remain scarce for thousands of years. Examples are gold, diamonds and other gems. Some items remain scarce for a very short time. Anyone remember Beanie Babies?

Technology and innovation are moving more and more products and services from scarcity to abundance in shorter and shorter amounts of time. Business models centered around something solely based on scarcity are among the riskiest ventures.

I’ve told the story before from the time I was in the professional photography business in Wichita circa mid-1980’s BD (before digital) about a business based on the scarcity of the fax machine. In that day, fax machines were new and expensive and they weren’t common. If you wanted to send or receive a fax, you had to go to a specialty business (Kinko’s, Sir Speedy, etc.) and pay $1 or so per page to send a fax to a similar specialty business elsewhere. Your recipient had to go pick up the fax. There was no email back then so the fax was a way to transfer documents, including signatures, instantly without having to wait on what we now call snail mail.

There was a guy in Wichita that was trying to build a business model around the scarcity of the fax machine. He wanted to have delivery vans in all the major markets of the United States to deliver the faxed documents from the specialty businesses to the recipients. He hired me to do a photo shoot of a driver making a delivery. I guess it didn’t occur to him, and his investors, that in a year or two, fax machines would be so common that all offices would have them and his business, including the huge investment in all these delivery vans would be obsolete. I’m not sure he got the business off the ground and, in fact, I’m not sure I was ever paid for my work on the photo shoot.

There was a day when personal computers were scarce and expensive. Some companies, I believe IBM was one of them, thought they would never be common and thus their expensive main frame computers would remain viable well into the future. This was nearly the end of IBM until they pivoted toward a service based, rather than hardware based business.

Today’s business models, based solely on scarcity of technology or the expense of production machines are vulnerable. In the blink of an eye, everything can change and yesterday’s scarcity becomes today’s abundance.

Meanwhile, there is something that remains scarce and will remain scarce; excellent customer service and attention to detail in serving the customer’s needs. This scarcity is based on human nature and not technology. Business models centered on this scarcity of customer service will be successful for years to come regardless of what technology they use to solve customer problems.

Jim Correll is the director of Fab Lab ICC at the Center for Innovation and Entrepreneurship on the campus of Independence Community College. He can be reached at (620) 252-5349, by email at jcorrell@indycc.edu or Twitter @jimcorrellks.

 

Jim Correll, director Fab Lab ICC at Independence Community College, Independence Kansas

I think I’ve underestimated the potential of entrepreneurship (now, I call it entrepreneurial mindset) since 2006 when I learned how to spell the word after accepting the position of facilitator/business coach of the Successful Entrepreneur Program at Independence Community College.

For many people, the term “entrepreneurship” implies business ownership or business “start-up.” Certainly, that is true sometimes, but entrepreneurship can be interpreted as a way of thinking of new ways to solve problems for others, many times with limited resources. Successful entrepreneurship includes continuous innovation as successful entrepreneurs knowing they always have to be looking for the next greatest way to serve their customers or coworkers.  Innovation sometimes means new inventions and/or new technology but many times it means a new twist on an existing idea.

Today I’m starting to realize that a goal of developing the “Mindset” among everyone in a region has a great potential—indeed, the only hope–to provide economic prosperity and overall satisfaction with life.

The overarching objective the Entrepreneurial Mindset class, featuring the Ice House Entrepreneurship curriculum is to learn how successful entrepreneurs recognize problems as opportunities and figure out creative ways to solve them. Pretty much, no matter what any of us do with our lives, we are involved in solving problems for others, or at least we should be. This can be as a self-employed business person, or as an employee in someone else’s company or organization. Entrepreneurial Mindset should go far beyond that; our social, civic and government programs should seek to solve problems for others with Entrepreneurial Mindset.

The eight life’s lessons in the Ice House curriculum provide the central themes of the “Mindset.” They are timeless and really have more to do with a way of looking at life and interacting with others than they do with specifically starting or running a business.

So, while we do talk about business start-ups in this class, what we really emphasize is how to learn to become better problem solvers. Entrepreneurs can be at work both within other companies and organizations as well as within their own businesses.  Employees that understand the “Mindset” will do a much better job at taking care of customers whether they are external to the company or internal customers within the same organization.

As more and more companies strive to be more innovative in our current entrepreneurial economy, look for more and more employees to come to the “Entrepreneurial Mindset” class and sitting down beside those with a goal to open their own businesses. All are looking for a new mindset to better view problems as opportunities and find innovative solutions.

The next class begins on January 9 and will occur on Wednesday evenings from 6:30 to 8 PM. The cost of the class (non-credit) is $135 with a $100 rebate available for successful completers. The class involves no heavy reading and no lecture. We view videos of successful entrepreneurs and bring local/area entrepreneurs to class to tell their stories of getting started. The class will include all ages, from a few traditional college students to a few young adults. There will be middle and retirement age adults. All will be looking for inspiration and new ways to solve the problems in the student, work and personal lives.

Jim Correll is the director of Fab Lab ICC at the Center for Innovation and Entrepreneurship on the campus of Independence Community College. He can be reached at (620) 252-5349, by email at jcorrell@indycc.edu or Twitter @jimcorrellks.