| Our Approach |
ISH Discovery
ISH
Implementation Methodology
ISH
SolutionSets™
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| Unlocking
the value of clinical and business management systems
is essential for the performance driven organization.
Since 1989, we have worked to deliver meaningful
programs and effective strategies to improve our
clients’ financial and operational performance
through their investments in IT products and services.
There are “lessons learned” we would
like to share. We want to help you think ‘business
strategy enabled by IT’ and then use our skills,
knowledge, and experience to fulfill the promise
of IT.
Truth is most IT endeavors don’t live up
to expectations. According to the META group,
84% of companies do not do ‘business cases’
for their IT projects at all or just do them on
a select few. In addition, 89% of companies are
flying blind with virtually no metrics in place,
and 57% perceive they are balancing the pressures
of cost cutting and IT effectiveness – but
perception is not necessarily reality. Too often,
projects are application-driven endeavors. They
begin with RFP’s, demos and site visits,
and continue through implementation using task-level
work plans and calendar-driven milestones. With
this approach, most organizations go-live but
never realize the financial, operational, and
care benefits of the full software implementation
that includes true process change. In addition,
this approach leads to the users questioning the
software’s capabilities. It is not uncommon
to hear “the software doesn’t work
for me”. With low user adoption, productivity
suffers and the cycle of blaming software is perpetuated.
Our experience shows benefits realization comes
from the processes you implement and not the software
you buy. Business process management is enhanced
by effectively integrating IT-enabled process
improvement throughout the organization through
Program Management. Program Management seeks to
manage a portfolio of projects and/or software
to achieve a set of business objectives or a common
business objective. Just as Project Management
will be used to manage individual project timelines,
tasks and activities, Program Management is used
to manage optimized organization-wide outcomes.
Combining these two disciplines in one unified
approach is the only way to get the results you
are expecting from your ‘budget / select
/ implement / support’ procedures.
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| ISH
Discovery |
| At ISH,
each and every endeavor begins with Discovery. The
objective of the ISH Discovery process is to create
a roadmap (i.e. “blueprint”) for benefits
realization by tying IT decisions to business requirements.
It is a collaborative series of integrated processes
that includes business needs analysis, organizational
readiness assessment, gap analysis, risk assessment,
process mapping, benefits (ROI) scorecard development,
Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) calculation, process
owner knowledge transfer, and team building. It
is much more than just simply planning for the project.
It is a strategic as well as a tactical approach
to assure that the goals and objectives desired
are in fact optimized and aligned with overall corporate
direction and that the scope, time, cost, and risks
are fully known and planned for upfront. |
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| Pre-Planning |
- ISH executives meet with client executives
to establish the initial goals and objectives
and to determine the initial key stakeholders
to be involved in the planning process.
- Fact collection forms are distributed to
assemble needed data prior to ISH arriving on
site.
- “Kick Off” meeting is scheduled
with key stakeholders and process owners.
- Individual meetings with key stakeholders
and process owners are scheduled for post Kick-Off
project communications and data collection.
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| Kick
Off |
| Kick
Off meeting is held to formally introduce the project
and its purpose, the governance, roles and responsibilities,
and the ISH and Client personnel to one another. |
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| Data
Collection – Interviews and Site Tours |
| Interviews
are to be conducted with all process owners for
each significant business process in each application
area. Please note that many of these interview participants
will indeed be the process owners. Additional interviews
may be needed based upon the specific organizational
structure and project needs. These interviews ideally
occur onsite; however, telephone interviews will
suffice in some circumstances. Additional data will
be gathered via site tours. |
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| Process
Mapping |
| Before
we can begin to develop “best practices”,
we must first understand the current state of business.
We do this by mapping out your current process flows
with formal flowcharts and then present the flows
for validation and acceptance. Once the current
flows have been completed and accepted, we can then
develop future flows that incorporate the business
needs and best practices. These recommendations
are provided in detailed current state/future state
process comparisons where specific processes are
granularly detailed. The benefits realized are depicted
as itemized components within our balanced scorecards.
Each recommendation within the scorecard will have
distinct ROI and benefits realization (baseline
to benchmark) that can be discussed and prioritized
with you. This will prevent getting overwhelmed
with recommendations and help the project stay on
course to achieve the improvement best suited for
your business objectives. |
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| Process
Narratives |
| After
the process flows have been completed, we are then
ready to narrate each process improvement by explaining
the current process flow, recommended process, and
resultant benefits. These narratives are to be in
summary or bullet point fashion and referenced to
the specific performance indicator(s) on the performance
scorecard. |
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| Review
and Validation with Process Owners |
| It is
imperative that ISH, the Executive Sponsor and the
appropriate Process Owners review the flows that
document the “current-state” of the
health organization. Our “Opportunity / Change
Barometer Workshop” is an opportunity to share
initial findings and propose direction. The goals
are to elicit reaction from the key stakeholders
to ensure we collaboratively proceed in a direction
that your organization is comfortable with. |
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| ROI
and Benefits Calculation |
| Our experience
shows that most organizations understand there is
a level of required process change needed to realize
ROI and benefits from software investments; however,
the open question is how much change is required
and how much change can the organization effectively
absorb. The decision to change is based upon the
defined operational and financial improvement opportunities,
the value of these opportunities to your organization,
the cost associated with realizing them, and the
readiness and organizational preparedness to achieve
them. During Discovery, we will assist you in making
informed decisions on where to operationally invest
in your organization, justify the investment, validate
the role of the system as the process change “enabler”,
and develop the right governance model and accountability
structure for the realization of the investment.
The Benefits and ROI will be documented in Balanced
Scorecards. These scorecards will be used to guide
the selection, govern the implementation, and help
you determine if you have achieved productive use
of your system, as well as providing metrics to
monitor ongoing success. |
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| Discovery
Deliverables |
Discovery will yield a “Roadmap to Benefits
Realization”. The Roadmap has two components:
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- The Blueprint – The
Blueprint documents the future-state business
model and the benefits that will be realized
by this model. This includes:
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a. Business Vision
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i. Documented Current State flow charts
and narratives
ii. Documented Future State flow charts,
narratives, and benefit expectations
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b. Business Benefits
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i. Balanced Scorecard of performance indicators,
including baseline and targets, to set project
operational and financial ROI expectations
and measure success. During Discovery, we
will define the specific indicators we recommend
the project be measured by. Indicators will
be selected based upon opportunities for
improvement and the associated priorities
assigned. The indicators will cross all
the Improvement Programs that an investment
in software represents including Resource
Utilization, Revenue Maximization, Business
Intelligence, Supply Chain Management, Patient
Experience and Risk Management. We will
use a portfolio of indicators that balance
Operational Excellence, Customer and Physician
Satisfaction, Professional Educational and
Development, and Financial Improvement.
ii. Change requirements to migrate from
the current to the future-state (i.e. Gap
Analysis). The requirements will include
a combination of data, interface and reporting
requirements, process and operations change,
and systems set up. We will also include
our assessment of cultural readiness and
attitude toward change, as well as any specific
barriers to change.
iii. Data and systems integration model
to support the IT Strategic Plans.
iv. Software functionality and integration
requirements to enable the new business
processes
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| 2. The
Project Workbook - The Project Workbook
defines the implementation approach and resources
required to close the “gap” between
the current and future-state. The Project Workbook
includes: |
a. Governance Model
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i. Project structure including the Executive
Sponsor, Executive Steering Committee, Project
Team, and Performance Improvement Teams including
membership and responsibilities.
ii. Issue escalation and change management
procedures.
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b. Phased Implementation Approach
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i. Sequence of implementation phases that
balances benefits realization with the efficient
use of resources.
ii. Scope and ROI to be delivered from each
phase.
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c. Implementation Resource Requirements
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i. Resource and hour requirements for implementation
activities including planning, data build,
system build, unit testing, training, production
and parallel testing, go live support, plus
post-live support and planning.
ii. Project team and end user training approach.
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| ISH
Implementation Methodology |
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