Disruptive Technology in Healthcare

Synopsis

Tools based on data and numbers have become commonplace in organisational decision-making. Tools such as net promoter scores (NPS), employee engagement scores, and dashboards are simple and commonly used in industry. These tools are attractive because of their simplicity. Other tools such as statistical models are more complex and can be unattractive because they are not easy to explain. There are two broad purposes for using data-based tools – first, they are used to motivate and/or incentivise employees, and second, they are used to make better decisions that bring growth for the organisation. This talk will argue that when the purpose is to motivate, simplicity should be preferred, but when the purpose is to make important decisions, complexity should be preferred. Examples will be provided for why decision-makers go wrong when they mix up the alignment of type of tool with the purpose to which the tool is being put.