What is the relationship between IT strategy and organization wide strategy?
Strategic goals between two organizations that are in the same industry will differ. Although they may be in the business of doing, relatively, the same thing, the strategy of one hospital will be slightly different from the strategy of another hospital. Similarly, the strategy of one department within a hospital will be different from the strategy of another department within the same hospital. The difference between these two examples however is this, the strategies of two departments within in the same organization should be working toward the achievement of the same overall strategy of the organization. Two differing hospitals have no obligation to align their strategies.
The point of HIS strategy should be to build the organization’s IT structure and functionality in support of the organization’s goals. The HIT strategy will, of course, have its’ own goals and objectives. However, the specific set goals and objectives within the HIT strategy should be in pursuit of the overall strategy of the organization. In essence, the role of an HIT strategic plan should be to translate the organization’s strategic plan into HIT language, including the infrastructure, resources, capabilities, and projects needed to achieve the overarching goals. The goals and objectives should push the organization toward the overall strategic plan, and if they hinder the pursuit of the overall strategic plan in anyway, they should be rethought. When developing a strategic plan for the HIT department, it may be beneficial to think of the organization’s strategic plan as a map or compass. It is a tool that will guide the direction of the organization as well as direct the path of the HIT strategic plan.
Lastly, the argument may be made that the development of a strategic plan for HIT plays a more critical role than the development of a strategic plan for another department. This is due to the nature of the work in an HIT department. HIT projects consume a great deal of resources, are costly, and take a significant amount of planning and time to implement. Because of this, a clear direction and clarity in decision making is critical for leaders in HIT, and having a HIT strategic plan can help bring coherence to HIT leaders as they guide their department.
What are the difficulties in crafting an IT strategic plan (changing technology horizons etc…)?
Creating a good IT strategic plan is challenging for many reasons. One of the possible challenges is a lack of strong leadership that will be accountable for proper, timely implementation. Implementing all components of a healthcare organization’s IT strategic plan is as important, if not more important, than formulating and writing out the strategic plan. conflicting priorities and interests among leadership on investment. Accountability ultimately means that each leader is responsible for helping to achieve desired goals through use of the implemented IT/IS investments. Likely, measurement of progress towards these set goals will be tracked by financial cost savings, workflow efficiencies or improved clinical outcomes. Without strong leadership, a healthcare organization’s IT strategic plan is guaranteed to fail.
Another challenge to crafting a good IT strategic plan is competing priorities within the healthcare organization. Strategic planning is about consensus building. Done appropriately, the process is meant to promote communication, participation, and collaboration. Unfortunately, competing priorities often still exist and impede the strategic planning and implementation processes, especially in healthcare organizations that are pursuing ambitious growth or many subsidiaries, members and parties to allocate organizational resources to. Sometimes, different members of the senior leadership team will be in direct conflict over whether or not the organization should spend money on purchasing and installing a new firewall or building out a new program.
Finally, we must be acutely aware is that technology is always rapidly changing. Each year, one will realize that the newest generations, editions and updates of last year are already outdated and soon to be replaced-- if not already replaced. Understanding of the dynamic nature of technology and the healthcare environment forces IT leadership and organizational leadership to look both short term and long term when deciding what types of IT investments will be made today, as well as what to investments to hold off on. In an rapidly changing policy landscape as well, it is important to consider stay current on hot topic issues in healthcare reform and innovations in health IT management.
What are the key criteria that should be viewed as most important while creating an IT strategic plan?
One of the key criteria of an effective IT strategic plan is its alignment with the organization’s goals. Therefore, when formulating an IT strategic plan, the most important thing to do is to first review the overall strategic plan of the entire organization, including its mission, vision, and values. This allows for the easy identification of areas where technology could enhance processes, which often helps establish a direction for the IT strategic plan. Similarly, as various projects are being considered for the IT plan, they should be evaluated on the bases of how they could contribute to the strategic goals of the organization. Overall, however, the “plan should focus on business needs, the ability of IT to meet those needs, how to close any gaps, how decisions will be made, and how to measure progress,” according to cio.com.
It’s essential to note though that it is not the deliverable itself that is most important when developing an IT strategic plan, but the process of creating it. Stakeholders and internal staff should be surveyed, interviewed, and involved in a variety of other ways in the development of the IT strategic plan. There must be collaboration between IT and non-IT staff so that ideas can be generated, common themes extrapolated, and a direction for the plan selected. In order for the plan to be implemented at some point, this creation process must ensure that partnerships are cultivated and silos broken down so that those who perform the functions affected by the plan have some buy-in.
Additionally, as is the case with any strategic plan, metrics and a review process should be identified. These are key to developing effective IT strategic plans because an organization must be aware of the progress made toward their goals. Because strategic plans span a period of approximately three to five years, it is important to evaluate progress and review methods to ensure that everything is performing as it should. If something is wrong, the review process allows an organization to catch the error and adjust so that they do not head too far in the wrong direction.
The last key criteria of an IT strategic plan to be mentioned here will be brevity. Plans and reports often come with executive summaries because people rarely will take the time in a professional setting to read more than a few pages. Keeping this in mind, it is wise to keep an IT strategic plan brief and focused on just the most crucial elements. Additionally, “sharpening the focus allows the team to be bolder and the plan to be more actionable and visionary.” While there are numerous other criteria to be considered when developing an IT strategic plan, organizational alignment, stakeholder engagement, metrics, and brevity are a few of the most important criteria that should be considered.
How can an IT strategic plan ensure that the organization remains flexible and able to build upon their existing foundation?
The IT strategic plan must fall into step with the overall goals and plan of the organization. The link between IT strategy and the organizational strategy involves building an IT infrastructure surrounding initiatives such as: adding or changing services,improving services, expanding services, or improving data sharing amongst entities. The linking of the two strategies usually means an improvement in core processes and information management. An example of this would be the use of drug interaction software. Drug interaction software can quickly alert a prescriber or reviewing pharmacist or nurse about potential conflicts at the moment a medication’s name is entered. A good software program can perform the checks and make the alerts more quickly and reliably than a manual system. This type of improvement in core processes would ensure that the number of medication errors would decrease, thus fulfilling the organization's overall goal of reducing medical errors of all kinds.
The IT strategic plan should be a roadmap that outlines exactly what deliverables will contribute business value and where an organization can gain competitive advantage within the marketplace. The IT strategy must be pliable enough to accommodate new business priorities and technologies that have the potential for driving growth within the organization, and the IT leadership team should look at areas where technology could enhance the overall mission and vision of the organization. The strategic plan must not only outline timeline goals, it must be clear about its ultimate goals, including a list of technology investments that the IT department deems a priority to contribute to the organization's success. This will create a check and balance to ensure the IT strategic plan always comes back to the overall strategy of the organization.
Finally, since the healthcare industry is calling for a more patient centered approach, it is important to build upon this IT strategy to improve workflows. There are tools that can be implemented by IT which are patient-facing. Patients may like the convenience of using a kiosk instead of waiting to check in with the receptionist. Or perhaps the use of a tablet device for an online interpreter service which can be used at a moment's notice instead of trying to book an in person interpreter.
How is IT able to provide competitive advantages for its organization?
In order to provide an organization with a competitive advantage, an IT solution must impact the way that the organization interacts with its patients in some regard. Instituting a computerized billing system can be an important organizational goal but since the patient is unlikely to know about it or have it affect them, it is not truly a form of competitive advantage. The implementation of an EHR system was viewed as a significant advantage for an organization several years ago. However, now that every hospital has some form of EHR there are less obvious opportunities for an organization to differentiate themselves from their competitors in this regard.
Other forms of technology can lead to improved patient care. On the primary care side of the organization, technology such as self-scheduling or patient portals may greatly increase user satisfaction and provide an advantage. Access to care through reduced wait times can be frustrating for many patients so any IT strategy which makes this process easier might provide an advantage. At the very least, they can prevent falling further behind even if they are unable to lead to a direct advantage themselves. For hospitals a major source of competitive advantage comes from medical devices and technology. Having a device which allows them to perform rare or difficult types of surgery can provide new revenue streams for the hospital which are unavailable to nearby organizations. Before undertaking this type of investment there must be a thorough market analysis performed in order to make sure that the capital investment, which can cost tens of millions of dollars, has a suitable return on investment within that market.
The last element that can provide a competitive advantage for a healthcare organization is quality. It becomes much more difficult to pinpoint a specific IT investment to lead to this type of advantage and instead must be viewed as a whole. Organizations which choose to differentiate themselves on the basis of quality need to look at many different IT investments to shore up areas of weakness and improve strengths. Increasing the ability to use population-level data to provide better management of care might be one way to market on the basis of quality. Strategy plays an increasingly important role in the way that an organization addresses quality in an environment moving ever closer to population health and value based payments.
How does the potential future for value based payments and population health shape the way that IT strategy should be created?
With the aftermath of the elections, many wonder and possibly worry about the future of value-based payment initiatives. Because transparency and data for patients and providers as well as for payers were ideas of interest long before the Affordable Care Act was even drafted, there should be no real concern regarding the future of the value-based care and its influence on HIT strategy. In fact, HIT has been on the bipartisan agenda for as long as health information has been incorporated into technology. Both democratic and republican parties support health IT and agree that it just makes sense.
One example that health IT strategy is not much different despite party differences lives in the inherent values of Newt Gingrich. Gingrich advocates for “a transformed, more personally responsible, incentive-led, and information-rich system” to reduce medical errors and allow for EHR systems to be interoperable so that IT can be a backbone for healthcare to provide real-time strengths for which to make critical decisions whether it is in the hospital or for a national crisis like bioterrorism. Ultimately this allows for care to be deliberate to minimize unnecessary expenditures and costs.
If the ACA is repealed without an alternative that has a strong health IT focus, about 10 million Americans may lose out on health care coverage and access. This also stampedes on the ability for health care delivery systems to make an impact on population health as a potential 10 million people will not be able to go in regularly to see a healthcare provider. There will be less or no tracking of patients’ health status and it also challenges whether effective measures can be made regarding quality. Care quality gaps can be identified and people who are slipping through the cracks can be identified more quickly and easily.http://library.books24x7.com.offcampus.lib.washington.edu/assetviewer.aspx?bookid=73688&chunkid=640886457¬eMenuToggle=0&leftMenuState=1
http://www.aalgroup.org/newsletter/?p=279
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