At the risk of this being seen as a personal comment to you Cassandra 
(which I don't mean), I have to disagree with everything you've written 
here.

I think it's very dangerous to assume that everyone is doing their best, 
as that becomes a huge disclaimer than nothing can change, and only the 
best that could be achieved, is being achieved.  When bad service is 
being given in any large organisation "we're only doing our best" is 
usually a sign that the individuals saying it are overworked, undermined 
and feeling personally attacked.  All too often we see the failings of 
an organisation as the person in front of us, and if they say "I am 
doing  my best" they mean "don't ask for more than can be done."  It is 
only when you question, probe and push, do find out that there isn't 
enough resources, that the manager in charge in passing on inaccurate 
information, and thus promoting, bad practise, and that no one has set 
the tone for appropriate standards of care.

"I'm doing my best" should never be an issue.  If you turn up to work - 
you do your best for that day.   How much effort or emotion you put into 
your job, should not have anything to do with the standard of care, or 
the basic knowledge and skills available in your workplace.  That should 
come from good management - not the goodwill of the individual worker.

Workers in any field where they connect with the hearts and minds and 
bodies (and souls) of other people, are only required to do 'enough'.  
Just like motherhood - being 'good enough' is all that's required. If 
they are overstretched, frazzled and not working to a high enough 
practical standard of care - the system they are in is at fault.  Only 
by pointing that out again and again and again, will it change.  
Accepting everyone is doing their best, will only promote the status quo.

Also, you cannot ascribe goodwill to an entire organisation: you can 
only judge on the standard of care received.  If it falls short - you 
must complain to the organisation and demand change.  The organisation 
has extended the package of care - not the person who failed you 
personally.

There is also the issue of what 'doing their best' means.  Everyone had 
a different standard - that's why there has to be an appropriate level 
of care set by management, and management have to make sure it is met.  
If your management is not protecting you within its own guidelines, you 
have to complain, no matter that the manager directly above you is 
"doing their best".   If the care you receive falls short, no matter 
that each person in the chain is "doing their best", then you make the 
organisation accountable. 

No single profession in the world has everyone entering with a common 
goal: that would be impossible.  Equally, no single profession has only 
good workers.  There are lazy no-good annoying and incompetent workers 
in every single career in the world - it is inevitable, for that is 
human nature.  Again, this is why it comes down to making the 
organisation accountable, not the individual.

Individuals stand out when they provide more than the standard level of 
care.  They are extraordinary, in the true sense of the word.  When 
individuals provide an ordinary standard of care - and it's not enough 
care - then the system has failed and needs made accountable. 

I'm not suggesting you do not respect each person in their own right, 
and treat them with anything other than compassionate acceptance of the 
difficult place they might be in.  However, that does not extend to 
accepting lower standards.  No matter the personal best of the worker - 
the system must allow and accommodate for all to have the minimum care 
required.  Drive the standards UP to the minimum: never accept less.

Yes, it is idealistic, but in the many years I've worked in may 
different types of overworked and underfunded organisations, I've come 
to believe that it's the only way to ever change anything.  Strong, 
proactive and supportive management must be made to happen everywhere - 
by complaining long and loud and hard, no matter the 'best intentions' 
of individual workers.  If you are complaining all the time and nothing 
is changing - you need to learn to complain better and go higher up.

I should explain that I've been at the hard end of "only doing our best" 
for nearly two decades. My husband is severely disabled, and has 
required a lot of care and medical support for many years.  We spent 
many years accepting that "doing our best" was good enough.  It is only 
when we stopped accepting this caveat, and demanded true accountability 
for what the system says is the minimum standard of care required, that 
we got those minimum standards.  And in places, made changes that then 
meant that others also got them too - as we went after the system, the 
system had to respond. 

Therefore, in my eyes "only doing their best" is a pernicious thing, 
like bindweed.  On the surface, a beautiful flower, but underneath, the 
roots are growing in the dark and strangling the life out of everything 
it touches. 

I don't require anyone to do their best for me and mine: I require they 
provide the accepted standard of care - the 'good enough' level  that 
the guidelines for their organisation lays out.  If I get less, I 
complain to the managers.  If they don't respond, and change the 
practice, I go over their heads until I get someone who does respond.  
I've often found this has then benefited the very people at the bottom 
who were most upset about my complaint: for the system then changes to 
support them.

The issue is not whether each and everyone of us is doing our best... 
it's whether or not we are doing /enough/.  If we are not, and it's the 
system stopping us - then we have to attack the system ceaselessly.  
Become the dog worrying the bone.  That which you permit, you promote.  
The perspective required is not how busy, over worked or badly trained 
people might be: it's have they met the standard?

So the question to ask when faced with anyone is any situation who is 
affording care to others is not "are they doing their best?" but "have 
they done good enough"?  if the answer is no, you have to act, no matter 
how nice or well intentioned the person is.

I also, by the way, phone those same managers and praise those who have 
given more than required.  Again, far more effective than just telling 
the person they did good (although you should always do that too!)

Again, Cassandra, apologies for responding so in opposition to your own 
words.  I have no intent here to attack you, or your position, merely 
state my own.  I understand utterly about respecting others, and where 
they come from.  I'm just of the opinion that too much acceptance of the 
personal over the professional, actually inhibits improvement in the 
system. 

Morgan Gallagher
Online Lactaneer
Only this week told by a young woman "doing her best" that I couldn't 
have an MRI scan as it would "stop my milk".  After three frustrating 
phone calls in which I wasn't listened to by three other people "doing 
their best" who got personally upset that I was complaining, I finally 
had to get my lawyer to phone and complain.  With the result that all 
the people in this system who had been "doing their best" now know MRI 
scans do not "stop milk" and as a result, several other mothers who've 
been in pain, and waiting on the list until they weaned, are now being 
scanned.  Every single person in the link was doing their best - but the 
system had failed me as a breastfeeding mother - AGAIN!  *gnash*  ;-)


Cassandra Leahy wrote:
> PERSPECTIVE--Is it possible to assume that everyone is doing their best, that 
> we all entered into our profession with a common goal.  Assuming we all have 
> strengths and weaknesses, that when we work together, truly as a team of 
> continuous care for the clients we serve, that we are offering the best their 
> is.  
>
> No one is perfect and there always is room for improvement.  I love what I do, 
> and in order for me to maintain a positive outlook, I have to believe that we 
> (here in the hospital setting) do some good.  I assure you our intentions are 
> genuine. 
>   

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