On June 21, 2017, I was honored to accept EY’s prestigious Entrepreneur Of The Year® 2017 Midwest Award on behalf of all MedSpeeders.
The competition has been around for 31 years and is one of the most significant, if not the most significant, competitions recognizing such areas as innovation, initiative, growth and culture. Some truly incredible companies have received the same award we did last night.
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We just learned that MedSpeed made Inc. Magazine’s 2016 list of America’s 5,000 fastest-growing private companies, the qualification for which is based on revenue growth percentage over a three-year period.
In part, this has a lot to do with timing. Healthcare is moving from acute-care focused to non-acute care focused. Health systems are getting bigger with more points of care along the entirety of the care continuum. These larger systems are working very hard to capture the benefits of scale through greater systemness. This all points to an expanded need for – and available value creation from – intra-company logistics, the category that MedSpeed – and all of our team members – has made its life’s work.
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A few weeks ago, Crain’s Chicago Business published an article that focused on the University of Chicago Booth School of Business’ New Venture Challenge (NVC). The NVC was started 20 years ago. It is what started MedSpeed on the path it is on today and I was fortunate to be able to be a part of it.
I share this article because I appreciate the opportunity this program provided to me, and MedSpeed. I thank the NVC and Crain’s Chicago Business for highlighting the great things that this program is doing to encourage entrepreneurialism across the country.
I’ve written before about lessons the healthcare industry can learn from the general business community. The story of the eventual collapse of 94-year old RadioShack, as posted by Becker’s Hospital Review, is another great lesson we can learn – and a cautionary tale for us all. As Tamara Rosin wrote:
RadioShack, like all businesses, is not immune to the impacts of changing technology and evolving consumer forces. Adaptability, business savvy, connectivity with consumers and strong leadership are critical for sustaining in a fast-paced market.
Ms. Rosin then goes on to list some key lessons to prevent your hospital from going the way of RadioShack.
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Integration is a topic I am very interested in. It is a large part of what we do and I pay close attention to integration-related discussions and articles. Recently, I came across this HealthLeaders interview with Joe Gifford, MD, the CEO of the Providence-Swedish Health Alliance, which speaks to this very topic.
With the continual changes the healthcare industry has experienced, the mantra of “adapt or die,” has been heard before. But according to Mr. Gifford, that analogy to evolution biology really rings true. His take? Only organizations that take chances (adapt) will survive.
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“Healthcare providers as a group continue to operate with slim and shrinking margins,” according to recent analysis from Modern Healthcare. Sadly, that’s not a surprise to most of us. The study—which included acute-care, post-acute care, rehabilitation and specialty hospital groups as well as stand-alone hospitals— found that the average operating margin in 2013 was 3.1%, which was down from 3.6% in 2012. Over 61% of organizations saw their operating margins erode over the previous year.
While we’ve seen this coming, the news is sobering. And analysts are skeptical that the worst is over. According to Modern Healthcare, all three credit-rating agencies hold negative outlooks for the not-for-profit healthcare sector.
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A recent article in Becker’s Hospital Review began: When a successful innovator like Wal-Mart is urgently reinventing itself, America’s hospital executives should take note.
Indeed.
For years, Wal-Mart has been the envy of retailers, driven by a huge buyer base, new technology and a very tight supply chain. But things began to shift and the economy wasn’t the only reason that the retail giant had five straight quarters of negative U.S. sales and six quarters of declining store traffic. There were weaknesses in Wal-Mart’s basic business model, which had always worked, until they didn’t.
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What will the hospital of the future look like? Not that much like hospitals looked 10 years ago according to an article in HealthLeaders. That conclusion is probably not a huge surprise to those of us in healthcare who have seen the shift away from an inpatient setting as the primary care modality. And while inpatient care may still be the anchor of many health systems, its role in the continuum of care is dramatically changing.
Author Phil Betbeze writes that the hospital of the future will be “a cohesive amalgamation of plenty of outpatient modalities that represent growth in healthcare.” He goes on to point out that while this shift doesn’t mean new patient towers won’t be constructed, it does mean that any construction undertaken “will be based on adaptability, patient flow and efficiency gains.”
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Hospitals & Health Networks, the magazine of the American Hospital Association recently released its list of the “Most Wired Hospitals, 2014.” On this notable list were a number of MedSpeed partners including UPMC, Advocate, Avera, Inova, Rush and Orlando Health. Congratulations to those and the other institutions recognized.
According to the cover story announcing the 16th annual Hospitals & Health Networks’ Most Wired list, hospitals that top the list employ a strategy around second-curve metrics to align health systems, physicians, clinical and nonclinical people across the continuum of care. Wired hospitals have effectively deployed a variety of foundational technologies and now have their eyes on data analytics and population health management.
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Annual cost reduction targets have most healthcare organizations scrambling. Despite concerted efforts, many internal cost reduction initiatives “fail to produce the level of savings required” as Liz Kirk writes in Healthcare Finance News.
Why is that? Many factors can contribute to the success or failure of an organization to achieve savings’ goals, but the most common mistake is not taking a holistic approach. Ms. Kirk contends that rather than a conventional cost reduction approach lead by the CFO, a successful initiative should include the financial and operational senior leaders, as well as support teams and cost leaders. The key is to effectively balance quality and patient satisfaction with savings.
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