Customer Story - YALE NEW HAVEN HEALTH PART 1
Yale New Haven Health’s CEO Partners with WILL To Develop Teamwork Training that Drives True Impact
Yale New Haven Health partnered with WILL Interactive to develop Common Ground Healthcare, an award-winning harassment and abusive conduct prevention training tailored specifically for the healthcare industry. Grounded in extensive research and real-world scenarios, the course has become a gold standard used by leading medical institutions to foster respect, teamwork, and a zero-tolerance culture, improving workplace behavior for over one million professionals.
Solution
In-depth focus groups to shape learning objectives
Realistic, healthcare-specific scenario development
Interactive, award-winning training delivery
Company Size
26,000 Employees
Industry
Healthcare
Impact
Transforming healthcare culture by improving respect, safety, and professionalism for over one million workers
Project Overview
Yale New Haven Health collaborated with WILL Interactive to create Common Ground Healthcare, a groundbreaking harassment and abusive conduct prevention training designed specifically for healthcare professionals. Building on WILL’s extensive experience across multiple industries, the course uses realistic scenarios and ethical decision-making pathways to foster a culture of respect, collaboration, and professionalism. Developed through in-depth focus groups and expert interviews, this program has set a new standard in healthcare workplace culture and is widely adopted by leading medical institutions.
Key Highlights
- Facilitated dozens of focus groups and key personnel interviews to gather insights and define learning objectives
- Designed and scripted realistic, context-driven scenarios tailored to healthcare settings
- Programmed, filmed, and edited engaging interactive content to model professional behavior and a zero-tolerance culture
- Conducted pre- and post-test evaluations to measure effectiveness and drive continuous improvement
The Need
Yale New Haven Health (YNHH), affiliated with Yale University, Yale School of Medicine, and Yale Medicine, is Connecticut’s leading healthcare system supported by the skill and expertise of more than 7,500 university and community physicians and advanced practitioners. Yale New Haven Hospital is nationally ranked among the best hospitals in the United States, according to U.S. News and World Report.
As the second largest employer in Connecticut with more than 31,000 employees and its status as one of the leading medical organizations in the world, a high-performance culture at Yale is critical.
The CEO of YNHH was exposed to WILL Interactive’s methodology through the Common Ground Business harassment prevention course but was unable to find programs of similar quality for the healthcare workforce. She asked WILL to create a similar program set in healthcare to achieve excellence within her own organization but also impact the greater culture of professionalism industry wide. The CEO of YNHH had a vision and partnered with WILL to achieve substantial impact.
The Answer
YNHH and WILL partnered to develop the best harassment and abusive conduct prevention training ever created specifically for healthcare with an emphasis on fostering respect, teamwork, collaboration, and excellence.
WILL’s experience in harassment prevention course development began in 1998 and WILL subsequently developed multiple courses on harassment, discrimination, or related topics for professional sports, the military, police officers, students/teachers, and others in a variety of professions. WILL also had a history of training within the healthcare industry, tackling subjects such as healthcare-associated infections, patient-centered care, and safer opioid prescribing.
WILL believes that to effectively change behaviors, audiences need the content grounded in the context of their lives, their events, and realistic decisions. Through accurate but entertaining scenarios, they are presented with ethical dilemmas and potential choices that take them down a variety of different pathways.
Addressing What Matters for Their Business
The Process
YNHH hosted dozens focus groups and key personnel interviews, offered subject matter expertise, and administrative guidance. WILL Interactive conducted the focus groups, interviews, and other research to determine learning objectives and methods. Scenarios and content were designed, written, programmed, filmed, and edited by WILL Interactive. The final course models the traits necessary for fostering a zero-tolerance culture, grounded in Yale’s standards of professional behavior.
Evaluation
A pre and post-test analysis was conducted to measure Common Ground Healthcare’s impact upon knowledge, attitudes, and behavioral intent. All outcome measures showed improvement, with most showing statistically significant results.
In addition, qualitative ratings were gathered with over 99% of users (n=11,817) giving feedback that Common Ground Healthcare is effective at helping them in their work.
The Results
The result was the award-winning Common Ground Healthcare – now the gold standard for harassment and abusive prevention in healthcare and research institutions.
Among the leading organizations using Common Ground Healthcare to improve culture are the National Institutes of Health (and affiliated contractors), Mass General Brigham Hospital System, Hospital Sisters Health System, Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard, Prevea Health System and others.
The course has helped raise on-the-job performance for over 1 million individuals and counting.
