Webinar

Teamwork and social capital: The secrets to building a culture of high reliability

60 minutes

Join Press Ganey’s Chief Safety and Transformation Officer Dr. Tejal Gandhi, MPH, CPPS and Cambridge Health Alliance (CHA)’s Chief Quality Officer Dr. Maren Batalden, MPH and Associate Chief Quality and Patient Safety Officer Taruna R. Banerjee, MPH, CPHQ, CPPS as they explore how social capital and teamwork impact safety culture.

This session spotlights how CHA has advanced its High Reliability journey through a variety of principles, including embedding Just Culture into daily practice, adopting Everybody Behaviors, strengthening cause analysis, and implementing tiered huddles and learning boards. As a safety-net system with a highly unionized and diverse workforce, CHA tailored its tools and strategies to fit its culture, prioritizing trust and relationship-building across teams.

A key area of focus—and impact—has been teamwork. CHA’s HRO work has contributed to notable improvements in teamwork measures, including staff perceptions of collaboration, communication, and mutual support. These gains reflect increased social capital and psychological safety among frontline teams and leaders.

Complemented by rising safety culture scores, CHA’s experience offers a practical, people-centered roadmap for other community hospitals looking to drive high reliability through stronger teamwork and trust.

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Featured speakers:

Dr. Tejal Gandhi, MPH, CPPS

Dr. Tejal Gandhi, MPH, CPPS
Chief Safety and Transformation Officer, Press Ganey

As Chief Safety and Transformation Officer, Dr. Gandhi, MPH, CPPS is responsible for improving patient and workforce safety, and developing innovative healthcare transformation strategies. She leads the Zero Harm movement and helps healthcare organizations recognize inequity as a type of harm for both patients and the workforce. Dr. Gandhi also leads the Press Ganey Equity Partnership, a collaborative initiative dedicated to addressing healthcare disparities and the impact of racial inequities on patients and caregivers. Before joining Press Ganey, Dr. Gandhi served as Chief Clinical and Safety Officer at the Institute for Healthcare Improvement (IHI), where she led IHI programs focused on improving patient and workforce safety.

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Maren Batalden, MD, MPH

Maren Batalden, MD, MPH
Chief Quality Officer, Cambridge Health Alliance

Maren Batalden, MD, MPH is associate chief quality officer, associate director of graduate medical education for quality and safety, and director of medical management within the accountable care organization at the Cambridge Health Alliance in Cambridge, Massachusetts. The Cambridge Health Alliance (CHA) is an integrated healthcare delivery system that includes a network of primary care clinics, three emergency departments, two community hospitals, comprehensive behavioral health services, and a public health department. Batalden provides leadership for improvement initiatives in the domains of inpatient care, care transitions, and cross continuum population health projects for patients with chronic disease. She is clinically active as a hospitalist and is engaged in teaching quality, safety and systems improvement to undergraduate, graduate, and mid career health professional learners. In all of her work – as a practicing clinician, as an educator, and as a leader of institutional change projects, she is interested in using the lens of co-production to catalyze more effective partnership between patients and health professionals.

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Taruna R. Banerjee, MPH, CPHQ, CPPS

Taruna R. Banerjee, MPH, CPHQ, CPPS
Associate Chief Quality and Patient Safety Officer, Cambridge Health Alliance

Taruna R. Banerjee, MPH, CPPS, CPHQ, is a senior healthcare executive with demonstrated success in planning and delivering on strategic priorities. She has significant expertise in care transformation and improving clinical and operational workflows.

In her current role Taruna leads system-wide programs to improve culture of safety, patient and staff engagement, and performance excellence aligned with national patient safety goals. She has an extensive background in managing quality improvement efforts, change management, quality measurement, accreditation and regulatory compliance, and standardization of care. Taruna feels deeply committed to Cambridge Health Alliance mission and vision and is particularly proud of her work in leading CHA’s transformation to a High Reliability Organization and advancing Health Equity.

Taruna is a Certified Professional in Health Care Quality (CPHQ) and Patient Safety (CPPS). She has also completed the advanced training program (ATP) from Intermountain Healthcare and Lean Six Sigma Green Belt certification. She received her BA from Wellesley College and her MPH from Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health. Taruna joined CHA in 2019 after serving as a Director of Quality and Safety at Boston Children’s Hospital.

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