Park Ridge Hospital and its employee empowerment program are featured in the February issue of Incentive magazine, a national trade publication.

Park Ridge Hospital is one of three companies featured in the article about how businesses are using empowerment and motivation innovations to boost customer satisfaction and reduce employee turnover.

The Park Ridge Hospital program provides the hospital’s 1,000 employees with the training and tools they need to assess and address customer complaints. The tools include a “Levelheaded Chart,” which – much like the pain chart that hospital workers use – helps employees gauge customer dissatisfaction, and gift cards that employees can use to ease bad customer service situations.

 In place since January 2007, the program was created by a committee of top hospital employees, under the direction of Customer Service Manager Camy Horrell.

“I’m seeing a lot more confidence in staff members,” Horrell said of the program’s effectiveness. “They feel like they can handle the problems without passing them along to upper management. And it’s great for customers who don’t have to tell their story three or four times.”

Horrell said it’s an honor to be featured in the article alongside Qualcomm and The Ritz-Carlton Hotel Co., which is already so well-known for customer service.

With 65,000 subscribers, Incentive magazine covers the incentive industry, and research, trends and best practices in managing and motivation.

Park Ridge Hospital is an acute care facility that has provided superior medical care with Christian compassion since 1910. The hospital is one of 36 hospitals in the U.S. belonging to Adventist Health System. For more information about Park Ridge Hospital, or about other hospital services, visit www.parkridgehospital.org. To request a copy of the Park Ridge Hospital Physician Directory, contact the Business Development office at (828) 687-3947.