OperationsAdvisor helps IDN save $21+ million improving productivity
Sponsored by the Sisters of the Holy Family of Nazareth and the Sisters of the Resurrection, not-for-profit Resurrection Health Care is a family of healthcare services providing advanced medical care and exceptional customer service with compassion and hope. Eight hospitals, nursing homes, retirement communities, home health services, behavioral health programs and other services are located in many Chicagoland neighborhoods. The system has won many quality awards as well as a 2008 Modern Healthcare Best Places to Work award. www.reshealth.org.
Situation:
In 2005, leadership decided to implement a comprehensive labor management program to ensure the most cost-effective utilization of human resources in all of its programs and services.
Solution:
- Chose OperationsAdvisor labor management tool including comparative information, benchmarks and productivity applications to provide ongoing monitoring of labor efficiency
- Invested in five performance engineers plus an analyst (including a manager with relevant experience at another Catholic IDN) to provide manager coaching, implementation and ongoing management of system’s labor management program
- Selected benchmarking and productivity standards with manager input and embedded goals into budgets
- Educated managers and directors on use of tools .
Result:
- Since productivity goals are part of budgeting, they have more validity and managers are held accountable for those goals.
- OperationsAdvisor has evened the playing field by making productivity goals transparent, thereby encouraging collaboration among departments.
- Managers are eager to obtain biweekly reports to see performance against benchmarks.
- In the past two years, reduced FTEs by 350 without layoffs of patient care personnel at the hospital level; staff were redirected toward vacant positions.
- Realized more than $21 million in savings systemwide.
"The biweekly monitoring process has helped managers get more engaged in
financial performance. Now they understand why it’s important to collect all of
the charge information so that productivity will be measured correctly. As a
byproduct, in one year one department captured $250,000 worth of lost charges. .
. . The processes are now in place system-wide. Managers are beginning to
understand data reporting and the impact that it has on their results. They
understand much better how to staff to volume on a daily basis. . . . Some
departments are even holding daily 20-minute productivity meetings to see if
staffing levels need to be adjusted. . . . The new graphs in OperationsAdvisor
that correlate staffing to volumes are well received by our managers. It’s good
to visualize the relationship and it helps them monitor and improve productivity."
Jill Franklin, MHA, CPHQ
System Director of
Performance Engineering
Resurrection Healthcare