TEAM CLEANING - STEPS TOWARD SUCCESS
by Carl Solomon
Team Cleaning® has proven itself as an excellent solution for health care facilities looking to
contain costs while improving cleanliness. Facilities that convert from zone cleaning to team
cleaning realize significant savings, anywhere from 10 percent to 25 percent, due to productivity
increases and reduced equipment and supply costs. Just as important is the greater efficiency of
the team model resulting in cleaner facilities and increased employee safety.
Though team cleaning is a simple idea using teams of four to seven cleaning specialists to
perform specialized cleaning tasks in an assembly line manner, converting a large facility to this
model can be a complex and time-consuming task. The physical layout of medical facilities
presents many logistical challenges and cleaning staff and internal customers may resist what
appears to be a radically different cleaning approach. From planning to fine-tuning may take
from 6 months to a year and no matter how well you plan, difficulties will arise along the way.
“This is not a simple task,” says John Walker of ManageMen, a Utah-based consulting firm that
specializes in team cleaning, “It’s a great idea but even great ideas can take time.”
While the task may seem daunting at first, many health care facilities have adopted it over the
past decade, providing guidelines to follow as well as pitfalls to avoid. There are four essential
steps to take: consensus building, plan development, training and implementation, and
monitoring and refining in order to ensure a successful transition.
Before committing to team cleaning, a health care facility must have a management champion,
usually the environmental services manager. This person must thoroughly understand team
cleaning and be able to communicate its value to upper management, cleaning staff and internal
customers, as well as be committed to solving any problems that arise during implementation.
The value of management support cannot be understated and facilities without it are better off
staying the course with zone cleaning.
Consensus Building
Building support for the conversion is an essential first step for the team cleaning champion.
Because it represents a fundamental change in the way cleaning staff work and also in the way
services are provided to internal customers, both are likely to view team cleaning skeptically.
Internal customers may not understand the advantages of team cleaning and resent the additional
numbers of cleaning staff moving through their work area. Workers commonly fear team
cleaning is a euphemism for downsizing or they may simply resist changes that force them from
the way they’ve always worked. “All the fears of an organization come to the surface when
there’s a change,” says John Walker.
Familiarizing staff and internal customers with team cleaning and seeking their input are
essential to gaining their support. Walker recommends introducing team cleaning concepts to
management, cleaning staff and internal customers through educational videos available on the
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market. Beyond videos, a more personal approach is also necessary with cleaning staff and key
customers. Employees bring valuable knowledge about their jobs and can help identify practical
problems and alternative approaches. On the other hand, those who distrust the new cleaning
structure or feel shut out of the planning process may sabotage implementation by slowing down
on the job or not cleaning as thoroughly as they should.
Phil Sparks, Facilities Manager at Bozeman Deaconess Medical Center in Bozeman, Montana
has successfully introduced team cleaning at the Bozeman center and at St. Vincent’s Hospital in
Billings. Prior to implementation at both locations, he consistently promoted team cleaning at
staff meetings, in one-on-one communications, and brought in contractors to talk with the staff
and demonstrate new equipment, such as backpack vacuums, they’d be using. At Bozeman,
budget cutbacks had left cleaning staff feeling overworked and calling for the company to hire
additional workers. By listening to employees and answering their concerns about how team
cleaning would affect their work, Sparks convinced them that the new approach would make the
department more efficient without having to hire more staff. “You focus on the value of team
cleaning and getting employees in position do their job well,” says Sparks.
At Kaiser Permanente facilities, management/employee teams are formed to assist team cleaning
planning and implementation. Not only do these steering committees help develop the actual
plan they also provide an official forum for identifying and addressing employee concerns. This
is especially important when labor unions are involved, since any staff or workload changes will
affect union interests.
Through personal interaction, project leaders can help ease the concerns of internal customers by
explaining the motivations for the switch and showing them how team cleaning will improve
cleanliness in their part of the facility. For example, budget cuts have forced many health care
facilities to cut cleaning costs by doing things like emptying wastebaskets every other night
instead of nightly. With a waste specialist handling trash nightly under team cleaning, internal
customers can easily see the benefit of switching from zone cleaning.
Listening to internal customers can help uncover any special needs that individual departments
may have. Optical departments, for instance, contain expensive, delicate equipment and
department managers may only want the department cleaned during business hours when they
can supervise the work. Creating service agreements with departments that have special needs
can also help to articulate expectations and create a channel of communication about cleaning
logistics and performance.
Careful Planning
Developing an implementation plan involves defining the building layout, reconfiguring staff
assignments and converting cleaning equipment and supplies. Defining the area to be covered is
a critical first planning step because not all segments of a health care facility are necessarily
suitable for team cleaning. In general, the team approach works best for outpatient,
administrative and office areas, though some facilities also cover inpatient areas with teams.
Consulting companies can be helpful in defining how best to fit team cleaning to a specific
building. Often, consultants offer specialized computer software programs that help define
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building layout and work assignments. These computer models break team cleaning into its
essential components and allow managers to assign different time standards and shift
configurations to each task. This enables project leaders to experiment with different team
cleaning options to find the most productive arrangement. Managers can then print out detailed
job cards for each cleaning specialist that show where each one should be in the building at any
moment during their shift and how long each task should take.
Consultants also provide knowledge and experience about what’s worked and hasn’t worked at
other facilities. “They can help you solve the unsolvable problems,” says Phil Sparks. However,
it’s important not to surrender control of the process to consultants who, after all, are still
outsiders who won’t understand the facility’s culture as well as the facility’s own management.
Nor do they have to live with the results.
In most cases, existing cleaning equipment and supplies should be adequate for team cleaning
with some reconfiguration for the individual cleaning specialists. Instead of every cleaner having
a rest room cart, for instance, only the rest room specialist requires this item. Cleaning solutions
and chemicals are pre-measured to ensure precise concentrations and assigned to specialists
based on their individual respective tasks.
The one essential piece of equipment that may entail new purchases is the backpack vacuum
which enables vacuum specialists to cover a larger area more quickly than with an upright.
Equipment suppliers can provide assistance in selecting equipment and choosing the appropriate
mix of supplies. In selecting a backpack vacuum, for instance, Kaiser Permanente worked with
its equipment supplier to test eight different brands before finding the model that provided right
level of hygiene and ease of use for our facilities.
Before actually implementing the plan, managers and other key project leaders must thoroughly
review it, testing assumptions and evaluating whether the assignments and workflow are
practical. Plans should also factor in fatigue, ensure an equitable workload between cleaning
staff and be realistic about travel time needed to move between work areas. If there is an
employee/management steering team, their assistance in plan review is invaluable in detecting
inconsistencies or flaws in the plan.
Once project leaders are comfortable with the plan on paper, performing a dry run provides an
important “reality check” before going live. With job cards in hand, managers and teams walk
through the facility checking that every area is covered, equipment and supply resources are
adequate, and time assignments are realistic. If the work plan calls for a rest room specialist to
clean three toilets in six minutes, this is the time to verify that it’s feasible. The walk-through
will also help identify logistical details, such as needing additional keys and clearance badges for
the extra number of cleaning personnel now moving through new areas of the building.
Training and Implementation
Fortunately, training to implement team cleaning is a relatively uncomplicated process since the
actual cleaning tasks are not new, only the way in which they are ordered is different. Vacuum
specialists will need to be trained in the proper use of backpack vacuums but other equipment
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and supplies should be familiar to employees. Otherwise, managers should reinforce cleaning
methodology with individual cleaning specialists by reviewing the specific tasks on their job
cards.
Vacuum specialists need training in how to wear, move and clean with backpack vacuums for
maximum productivity and minimum fatigue. Using backpacks isn’t difficult but developing
correct usage habits is vital. For example, weight should rest on the hips via the padded waist
belt rather than hanging from the shoulders. Workers should bend at the knees instead of the
waist when vacuuming under desks. They should also alternate motions between the push-pull
movement typical of using upright vacuums and the side-to-side fanning movement with the
backpack’s aluminum wand that enables twice the productivity of uprights with a similar level of
exertion Implementing team cleaning is best done in a step-wise fashion. (Ref: 1998 Battelle
Memorial Institute study conducted in conjunction with the Dept. of Surgery Division of
Orthopedics, Ohio State University).
Never attempt to convert an entire facility at one time. Start with an area that can be covered by
one team and perfect the process there. Once project leaders are comfortable with team
performance in the pilot area, add Another section of the building and continue until you’ve
completed the conversion. Incremental implementation allows project leaders to work the kinks
out of the system before expanding to new areas and minimizes the number of problems to solve
at any one time.
Monitoring and Adjustment
Even with careful planning and gradual implementation, surprises are inevitable. Ultimately,
success hinges on monitoring for and adjusting to address unforeseen problems that crop up.
Begin developing baseline data about internal customer perceptions of cleaning performance
prior to implementation. By periodically repeating the surveys and comparing results with the
baseline data, project leaders can gauge how perceptions about cleaning performance change
during its implementation.
Surveys aren’t a substitute for the personal touch, though. Project leaders must be visible to
internal customers. When problems develop, internal customers want to deal with a manager
rather than a survey.
In the same vein, managers should maintain an open dialogue with cleaning staff about how
implementation is proceeding. Front-line employees may spot problems that aren’t easily visible
to managers or internal customers.
Regardless of where problems arise, it’s essential for the manager to take responsibility to solve
them quickly. During those first few months, team cleaning is on trial. Managers who
aggressively seek out staff and internal customer concerns and visibly solve problems will make
sure that a favorable verdict is returned.
Resistance to change is a universal human trait, but so is the desire to see results. And,
ultimately, that’s what team cleaning delivers: cleaner facilities, a more efficient environmental
services department, and reduced labor and equipment costs. While the path to team cleaning is
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fraught with logistical challenges and some degree of internal resistance, following the steps
outlined here will minimize the difficulties and maximize the results.
Avoiding Missteps
1. Lack Of Management Commitment and Support
Internal resistance and logistical problems are inherent in switching to team cleaning. If the lead
manager and his or her supervisor aren’t committed to riding out the difficulties, the conversion
to team cleaning will fail. “It’s utterly impossible without management support,” says John
Walker of ManageMen.
2. Know What You’re Getting Into
Don’t expect (or tell others to expect) smooth sailing. Regardless of how well you’ve
planned, unforeseen problems will arise. Keep expectations realistic by acknowledging that
difficulties will arise.
3. Don’t Surrender Control To Consultants
You know your facility best. Make sure that consultants’ planning reflects the structure
and culture existing at your facility.
4. Adequate Lead Time
Don’t rush into implementation with critical details unattended. Converting to team cleaning is a
complex task. Leave plenty of lead-time for perfecting pilot programs and
dealing with the little things such as ordering new keys for cleaning specialists.
ABOUT CARL SOLOMON
Carl Solomon is a senior environmental services consultant for Kaiser Permanente, based in
Oakland, California. The environmental services consultant group provides guidance for
environmental services departments at 30 Kaiser Permanente hospitals in California, Oregon and
Hawaii and hundreds of Kaiser Permanente medical and dental office buildings and regional
supply centers nationwide. During his 23-year career in health care facilities operations Mr.
Solomon has been directly involved in converting four medical facilities to team cleaning and
has also served as division director of Kaiser Permanente’s San Francisco Medical Center. Mr.
Solomon has a Master’s in business administration from Golden Gate University in San
Francisco and a bachelor’s of science in operations management from Northern Illinois
University in DeKalb, Illinois.
For more information on Team Cleaning call 1-800-225-9153.
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