LifeBridge Health has unveiled an innovative and bold new effort to break through the status quo for healthcare systems and reawaken the organization’s purpose. The Care Bravely movement is the manifestation of that purpose and the culmination of a monthslong effort to mirror the values of employees and inspire a rallying cry for the organization as a whole. For LifeBridge Health team members, health care is more than just medical.
“Care Bravely is inspired by the people who work at LifeBridge Health who show up every day armed with the courage to restore spirits as well as to heal bodies,” says Neil Meltzer, president and CEO of the healthcare system. “They do the right thing, even if it’s the hard thing, by holding themselves accountable to our communities, our colleagues and themselves.”
Adds Meltzer, “Care Bravely plants a flag to let our team members, our patients and our communities know what we stand for and what makes us different. Really, we’re giving a ‘voice’ or a name to our long-standing values. With this alignment, we’re seeking to enhance our ability to provide consistently outstanding care to our patients and their families.”
“We’re unique and always have been. Care Bravely has been a way for LifeBridge Health to rediscover our purpose and make it more “hands-on” for a broad organization like ours. We also want to be clear about what drives the exceptional care we deliver – the passion of our team and taking care of the people in the communities we serve,” explains Brian Deffaa, chief marketing officer at LifeBridge Health.
Care Bravely was also developed with the healthcare organization’s history in mind. LifeBridge Health consists of Sinai Hospital of Baltimore, Northwest Hospital, Carroll Hospital, Levindale Hebrew Geriatric Center and Hospital, and related affiliates and subsidiaries. Sinai opened its doors in 1866 to give minority and predominantly Jewish doctors a place to practice when other hospitals would not, and the hospital provided care to all patients in an era of segregation. From that founding more than 150 years ago, LifeBridge Health has grown and thrived with an unwavering commitment to caring and community.
Working with StrawberryFrog, the world’s first movement marketing agency, LifeBridge Health wanted to “activate and ignite its purpose” around a simple but powerful idea that would both resonate externally and motivate internally. The idea is to embody the spirit of the people of LifeBridge Health.
“Optimism. Empowerment. Creativity. Trust. Passion. This is what the Care Bravely movement is creating among LifeBridge Health team members. Purpose branding is nothing if you can’t activate it among employees and consumers. Using our rigorous Movement strategic process, we identified a key insight: people want to be seen. This has currency among teammates as well as society and patients. This meant our movement on how 12,000 give-a-damn human beings bravely serve those in need, is a remarkable way to motivate people to care bravely about LifeBridge Health,” said Shana Bellot of StrawberryFrog – the Movement Marketing company behind the transformation and purpose based movement. She adds, “We say that Care Bravely is ‘inspired by employees who care like there’s no tomorrow and then do it again the next day.’”
The multi-platform Care Bravely Movement first launched a few weeks ago to the 12,000 team members who make up LifeBridge Health. “Care Bravely truly starts with our team members, so we felt it was important to start the movement with them. Already, we have received hundreds of Care Bravely stories on our internal website, and we’re just getting started,” says Deffaa.
LifeBridge Health will be sharing the Care Bravely stories on billboards, on television and radio, in print and online. They will not always be headline-making stories but little things that happen all the time that change people’s lives and health outcomes. The website, www.wecarebravely.org, will serve as the showcase for these stories, which range from simple acts of kindness to grand gestures.
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