People
Build the shared understanding and ownership that help a team work toward the same priorities.
- Clear roles
- Useful coaching
- Team accountability
The Project Compass framework
Three essentials.
One aligned practice.
Project Compass connects the people who do the work, the processes that guide it, and the performance signals that help leaders decide what to do next.
Process
Make important work easier to teach, repeat, and improve across the patient and business journey.
- Scheduling
- Patient experience
- Revenue cycle
Performance
Use a focused set of measures to understand progress and guide timely, practical action.
- Practice scorecards
- Targets and trends
- Follow-through
How the three work together
Clarity grows when the pieces connect.
A goal needs people who understand their part, a process that makes the work clear, and a way to see whether the effort is moving the practice forward.
Turn the goal into team action
Choose an outcome the team can understand. Identify who owns the next step, what routine supports it, and when the team will review progress.
- Keep the priority focused.
- Make ownership visible.
- Set a regular review point.
Start where the practice feels friction
Look for a repeated delay, unclear handoff, missed opportunity, or measure that is moving in the wrong direction. Use that signal to choose a useful starting point.
- Listen to the team closest to the work.
- Check the current process.
- Choose a next step the team can try.
The seven COMPASS disciplines
A clear direction, one letter at a time.
In Practice by Design, COMPASS is a seven-part sequence for turning a practice’s direction into dependable action. Each discipline builds on the one before it.
C
O
M
P
A
S
S
Clarify the destination
Define what the practice is working to become, beyond the production target it is trying to reach.
Explore this discipline →Own the numbers
Make operating measures visible and trusted so decisions can be grounded in what is happening.
Explore this discipline →Map the patient journey
See the experience from the first call through treatment, payment, recall, and referral.
Explore this discipline →Put the right people in the right seats
Make role ownership, decision rights, leadership expectations, and development clear.
Explore this discipline →Align daily execution
Turn goals into daily behaviors through huddles, scorecards, priorities, and follow-through.
Explore this discipline →Standardize what works
Capture repeatable processes so quality does not depend on anyone’s memory.
Explore this discipline →Scale with discipline
Expand only when the operating model is stable enough to be copied.
Explore this discipline →From Practice by Design, Book 1: the seven disciplines that guide the Project Compass approach.
Put the framework into motion
Give the team a clear next step.
See how Project Compass turns a practice priority into a routine the team can follow and review.