Ideas that Work: Supply-Saver

Do you ever notice how your fresh stock of facility-logoed pens always seem to disappear? If you don't want to lecture staff about "stealing" your dwindling supplies, try this counterintuitive approach: Hold a competition and reward the most prolific pilferer. Simply ask everyone to bring in their collection, place them on a piece of paper with their name and the number of returned pens on it, and reward the person who stockpiled the most. We held our first pen thief competition recently, and it was a rousing success. Staff got a kick out of the irreverent competition and the winner walked away with a small prize — as well as a great story.

Victoria Wiltshire, MBA, RN
SightTrust Eye Institute
Sunrise, Fla.
[email protected]