Health systems have spent years building organizational infrastructure around the work of gathering information, compiling reports and moving data between functions. Artificial intelligence is beginning to automate that work and in some systems, the displacement is already underway.
Peter Banko, president and CEO of Baystate Health in Springfield, Mass., has said he expects AI to displace significant categories of work including roles in finance, law and administrative functions, and his system is already building retraining programs in response. Executives planning for the next three years are examining the existing organizational structure and questioning whether their purpose is still relevant, or needs a reboot.
Bob Riney, president and CEO of Henry Ford Health in Detroit, said a workforce redesign is imperative, but the goal is not replacing people. Instead, he is redirecting them toward work that requires human judgment.
“As healthcare becomes increasingly complex, success will depend on our ability to align care delivery, health plan capabilities, physician partnerships, digital technologies and community resources around a shared goal of improving health outcomes, enhancing the patient experience and making care more affordable,” he told Becker’s. “Our focus is creating a structure that enables faster decision-making, clear accountability and greater coordination across the enterprise.”
AI will enable that coordination and accelerate process standardization to improve quality, efficiency and affordability of care delivery. Mr. Riney said the health system is setting the standard at the top but maintaining local leadership so teams can be very responsive to what their communities need.
“We anticipate leveraging technology, analytics, automation, and artificial intelligence to redesign work where possible and better support our workforce, allowing team members to focus more of their time on activities that create value for patients and consumers,” Mr. Riney said. “We will also remain open to strategic partnerships to enhance capabilities, expand access and strengthen our ability to fulfill our mission.”
Success is then measured by the health system’s ability to deliver better care and patient experiences. Mr. Riney also expects affordability to factor into whether health systems are appropriately serving the community, something that hasn’t always been top of mind for the executive team.
“Our structure will continue to evolve to support those outcomes while ensuring Henry Ford Health remains strong, innovative and sustainable for the long term,” he said.
Roberta Schwartz, PhD, executive vice president of Houston Methodist Hospital and chief innovation officer of Houston Methodist, echoed Mr. Riney’s sentiment. She expects the health system’s organizational structure to become more agile, interdisciplinary and tech-enabled. But their focus will always be centered on the patients.
“Our goal is to empower clinicians and create balance in their lives using technology that reduces administrative burden, improves decision-making and allows them to spend more time focused on patient care using technologies such as ambient voice, AI identification and summarization of conditions and telemedicine to augment weekend or night shifts or areas with occasional and non-predictable physician needs,” Dr. Schwartz said. “We also want to empower our patients with technologies that allow for control over time and care, personalizing care using technologies such as agentic AI for scheduling; the ability to ask questions of your record; having passive monitoring using remote devices; and being able to go to a physician in person or online.”
The tech-enabled transformation requires technology experts, change management champions and leadership buy-in. It also requires heightened governance equipped to manage the unique challenges AI presents without slowing down innovation too much.
“Ultimately, our success will depend on maintaining the culture we’ve worked so hard to establish where every employee is empowered to innovate, adapt and contribute to the future of healthcare,” Dr. Schwartz said.
In Cleveland, University Hospitals is finding the right balance as well. CFO Bradley C. Bond told Becker’s that policy changes, increased consumer expectations and emerging technologies are rapidly transforming health system structures.
“As care continues to shift from inpatient to outpatient settings, and as patients gain greater access to price transparency and AI tools that help with consumer choice, health systems must compete on quality, affordability and convenience,” he said. “To position University Hospitals for success, we are evolving our organizational structure and investment strategy in three key ways.”
University Hospitals is:
- Accelerating investments in ambulatory and outpatient care for more convenient and accessible care within the broader patient base.
- Leveraging human-centered AI enterprisewide for operational efficiency, patient navigation and consumer experience.
- Optimizing the care delivery platform for personalized care navigation.
“Ultimately, our focus is on building a more agile organization that can adapt to ongoing market changes while delivering exceptional clinical outcomes, improving affordability and expanding access for the communities we serve,” he said.
Jeffrey P. Gold, MD, president of the University of Nebraska System in Lincoln, is also changing the definition of organizational success based on the capabilities AI brings to the table. Health systems with the structures to respond to change quickly while remaining grounded in providing accessible, affordable and high quality care have a sustainable future. That means recruiting and retaining “exceptional talent” and investing resources in making sure talented individuals succeed.
“In an academic health system, flexibility also comes from strong clinical, education, research and innovation enterprises and opportunities for people to collaborate across disciplines,” said Dr. Gold. “At the University of Nebraska Medical Center, being part of a comprehensive university gives us the chance to connect exceptional clinicians and researchers with expertise in fields such as engineering, agriculture and data science, while a myriad of public-private partnerships further expand those connections and create new opportunities.”
Those strong relationships will help health systems and clinicians take advantage of emerging technologies.
“Artificial intelligence is a good example, as realizing its potential in healthcare requires the right people and partnerships to identify where it can meaningfully support high quality clinical and administrative work and improve how we deliver care without diminishing the human touch,” Dr. Gold said. “Sustained success will depend on organizational structures that bring out the best in people, strengthen collaboration and create the flexibility to respond to change while maintaining an unwavering focus on the highest levels of quality, safety, access and the patient experience.”
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