Strategy Alignment

Drive Strategy From the Top and Results Will Deliver to the Bottom Line
by Deborah Smith

Virtually all healthcare organizations invest significant time and effort in creating a strategy, only a small percentage are truly effective in translating this strategy into operational, clinical and growth results. Why so many leaders struggle to execute their strategies becomes clearer when the complex leadership challenge implicit in ‘strategy implementation’ is understood. What can be, at an executive level, a few bullets on a corporate or hospital balanced scorecard can translate to hundreds of interrelated metrics, projects, departments, and programs which require: well defined, validated, prioritized, resourced and monitored activities. Even when strategy is effectively translated into action, successful strategy implementation depends on alignment of the Market Intelligence (MI) and Business Intelligence (BI) which is used to define the Strategic Initiatives (SI) and drives the Performance Improvement (PI) of the organization.

As we welcome 2012, it is again time to consider how the strategic and operational goals will lead the organization to achieve the mission, vision and results needed to be in business. If your organization is like most, you may have not changed your strategies for several years. So how do you prepare and enter into a new dynamic time? NOVACES has best practice tools and techniques that can make a big difference in your performance and help to drive high producing strategies in 2012. Focus on the vital few activities that can be put in place the first quarter of 2012. Think of these activities as focused resolutions to ensure your place in the market.

One would expect to find healthcare systems fixated on their past success, strategies that have proven to best practices, and unable to change. That is neither the case, nor the problem. Actually, healthcare often changes too much and too fast. Like a vicious cycle, all the change has become chaotic at times, which further destabilizes the organization. The question often asks, “How much change can one organization endure?” At the executive level, corporate culture, shared belief systems and political changes creates an environment of constant change. Breaking down the strategic goals into meaningful objectives, identifying appropriate metrics and building performance balanced scorecard, identifying, prioritizing and successful implementation is a focused effort that takes dedicated focus, with the right team, right tools and right measures.

Healthcare leaders need a way to change course effectively and often quickly. The competition is seeking innovative ways to develop partnerships to deliver care in a different way. Having a comprehensive monitoring system can allow leaders to have their pulse on the programs that are completing on-time and delivering the business performance anticipated. NOVACES has the capabilities to enable leaders to turn these strategies into results.

NOVACES helps leaders get the top and bottom line results that comes from aligning strategies more effectively. Having powerful intuitive, comprehensive tools and methodologies can drive effective strategy implementation within an organization. A rapid planning method called Jumpstart allows organizations to plan and execute strategy in a process driven way. Using an experienced facilitator to do strategy mapping, balanced scorecard development and prioritized alignment at every level of the organization can clearly define the right portfolio of projects and resources capable to gain unprecedented ‘line of sight’ into decision making, implementation and mission critical results.

Real-time feedback on organizational results enables leaders to react quickly and effectively to change. Finding the right Business Intelligence, or BI, is a term that has historically referred to software applications used to analyze data. Today, BI is a term that has expanded to include the discipline of data governance, having a single source of truth data, the ability to make decisions real time, and having real time balanced scorecard that can be monitored from a computer 24/7.

With the public reported data emergence demonstrating healthcare‘s outcomes and satisfaction, it is imperative that leaders are proactive to ensure that the data is positively representative of the organization’s performance. The competition created with publically reported data is driving healthcare to think differently about the high visibility components such as profitability and market share, engaged employees, and customer satisfaction. BI data is leading organizations to pick the inefficient processes that need to be redesigned and where to focus right resources to get results to drive performance. BI demonstrates great promise, but appropriate implementation has to be engineered, accepted and adopted by the leadership team and guaranteed that it is a source of truth that can be trusted.

Healthcare reform and governmental regulations creates an uncertain future, decisions which make the best use of limited highly skilled resources and the implementation of strategic plans has never been needed more. A structured disciplined planning tools to impose processes, and highly trained process/performance resources deployed to minimize risks associated with the investment that is made into strategic decisions that have long term consequences in the market.

Given the changing dynamics healthcare leaders are facing today, aligning strategy and results has never been more critical. NOVACES is different from other consulting firms in the way we help leaders to adapt to the changing dynamics. We help in your strategy design by supporting you with highly experienced resources and expertise. We guide with the right tools to get bottom line results. We work with leaders to prioritize activities and decisions that realize the outcomes for sustainment. We enable self-sufficiency by working with leaders and coaching their teams and establishing a systematic structure for lasting changes.

NOVACES provides organizations a blended approach to process, industry expertise, ability to design customized solutions with the right tools, at the right time, with the right people that deliver bottom-line organizational results and growth that matter to their specific business and market situation. Multiple industry leaders have relied on NOVACES for services and solutions. So no matter what challenges your organization is faced with, you can count on NOVACES to deliver. Our engagements impart critical knowledge and expertise in a focused approach for strategy to drive results.