I recently read the book Good to Great by Jim Collins. In the book Collins and his team of researchers find that there is not a single defining action for achieving greatness, no grand game plan or inspired innovation, no miracle moment or lucky break. Instead, greatness is achieved through a cumulative process, step-by-step, action-by-action, decision-by-decision, and turn-by-turn.
Picture a huge heavy flywheel, a massive metal disk mounted on an axle. Your task is to get that flywheel rotating on its axle as fast and for as long as possible. You push with great effort, inching the flywheel forward until it completes one entire revolution. You continue pushing, and the flywheel moves faster though a second rotation. Keep working in the same direction. It builds up speed. You keep pushing, faster and faster it goes with each turn.
Then at some point, breakthrough. Momentum kicks in your favor, hurling the flywheel forward turn after turn, its own weight now working for you, not against you. You arent pushing any harder than the first rotation, yet the flywheel goes faster, ten times faster, a hundred times faster, with almost unstoppable momentum.
Now, imagine this analogy in regards to breakthrough opportunities in the health information management field and the healthcare industry in 2005.
Imagine what we can be achieved this year if we all work together to advance the national agenda for the electronic health record (EHR) with quality initiatives in the areas of standards development and implementation, work force development, and consumer adoption of personal health records.
Imagine what can be achieved if we are all strong advocates for adoption of ICD-10 by informing the healthcare industry about the urgent need for a better coding classification system and the benefits of making the upgrade. We can better accommodate advances in medicine, improve reimbursement, care quality, and disease management.
The American Health Information Management Association (AHIMA) and its 50,000 members are currently working on these and other initiatives. What are you going to do to get the flywheel turning to achieve breakthrough? Now is not the time to start seeing boundaries. Now is the time to see boundless opportunities.
Remember, it takes everyone across the healthcare industry, guided by our leaders and with disciplined action, accumulating and sharing knowledge, improving our skills and expertise, step by step, turn upon turn, building momentum until the tipping point the point of breakthrough. No contribution is too small, and every little push on that flywheel will make the difference.
I recently read the book Good to Great by Jim Collins. In the book Collins and his team of researchers find that there is not a single defining action for achieving greatness, no grand game plan or inspired innovation, no miracle moment or lucky break. Instead, greatness is achieved through a cumulative process, step-by-step, action-by-action, decision-by-decision, and turn-by-turn. 
