On September 13th Tracey will serve on the panel “Effective Leadership – Development in a Changing Healthcare Landscape” at Becker’s Annual Health IT + Revenue Cycle Conference. As part of an ongoing series, Becker’s is talking to healthcare leaders who plan to speak at the conference, which will take place on September 13-15, 2021 in Chicago.
To learn more about the conference and Tracey’s session, click here.
Question: What technology has taken on greater significance or value during the pandemic?
Tracey Crandall: Of course the biggest challenge was having the EHR customized to handle the new demands of COVID. COVID response requires special testing, some services in which we legally can not bill for (State and Federal mandates on some of the services being free), mandatory tracking and reporting to the State and Feds, managing your patient infections while balancing spread in the work place and ultimately worker infections. On the human capital side, complexities with workers compensation, leave of absence management, incentive pay and employee health and wellness (not reporting to work if you’re symptomatic and managing those symptoms, while being thoughtful about privacy).
Q: How has the coronavirus pandemic forced a paradigm shift in your line of work, from your perspective?
TC: I will answer in two ways. From the hospital perspective in that hospitals didn’t anticipate that the heart of their revenue stream (surgeries and procedures) would be shut down overnight. Then patient census plummeted (people fearful to come to a hospital environment), then you primarily only have COVID patients in your hospital; now you are left with expensive care, supply shortages (PPE), little to no regular patient volume and the hospital is immediately overstaffed with limited revenue coming in to support your operations.
From an HR perspective, having to pivot…sometimes daily, on the most recent CDC information, managing the fear inside the organization promulgated by the media (and sometimes miss information in the media), labor unions taking the opportunity to use the crisis as an organizing initiative. Maintaining a positive safety culture while delivering quality care and furloughing non-essential staff all at the same time. In the coming weeks, HR has to be ready to pivot again and redeploy the resources at the same pace as the patient volume returns to the hospital. This will be critical in assisting the hospital manage their overall financial recovery from this event.
Q: What is the most underrated trait of the best leaders?
TC: Calm! When the world is uncertain and fear prevails in the hearts and minds of a community, state, country or globe, a CALM leader who is not reactive but who is thoughtful and reassuring, one who also does not stoke the flames of fear is the single most important leader to have on your front lines. NO ONE wants or needs a ‘chicken little’ when Rome is burning. During times of crisis, senior leaders will see the best and worst of humanity inside and outside their organization. Calm, strong, reliable leaders are the best asset to an organization in regards to successfully weathering any storm as they will shepherd your flock safely to the other side.
Q: What fundamentals would you encourage your peers to revisit and refine when it comes to health IT and revenue cycle management?
TC:
I continue to see both my current and previous organization not engaging/optimizing their internal technology solutions to their fullest. I think hospitals and other health care providers buy expensive, robust technology and fail to invest in the proper project management that ensures timely ROI related to optimizing the investment. There is also a HUGE opportunity to launch the software with more front end stakeholder management both in regards to the change management as well as the ease of use to better facilitate engagement with the product.
Also, reporting, business decision support, scorecards and data, in general, continues to be woefully undervalued in the development and deployment. Once the system is in place, the entire emphasis is around ‘fixing’ and adding new but not streamlining, optimizing and auditing (proper revenue capture). As an executive, it’s very frustrating that we are relying so heavily on ad-hoc reports, excel exports and manual intervention on data.
At Becker's 4th Annual CEO + CFO Roundtable, taking place November 2–5 in Chicago, more than 1,500 hospital and health system executives tackle decisions that determine whether organizations thrive or merely survive: protecting margins under cost pressure, choosing where to grow, renegotiating payer relationships, stabilizing the workforce and proving real ROI on technology. This is where leaders work through them together, face-to-face. Apply for complimentary registration now.
