Not Your Grandma's Health Care

The health care landscape is quickly and dramatically changing. In my last post--the first of my three-part series on consumerism--we talked about this change and how critical it will be to design a consumer facing health care strategy in the new environment.

As I explained, the first step in plan development is taking an inventory of your current services, determining where you would like to expand or grow your consumer base and evaluating your capacity to do so. The second step, which I believe is the most critical, is all about your customer – getting to know who they are, what they want and what matters most to them. This is really the key to success.

But how do you achieve this?

Today’s health care consumer is not the same as in previous generations. In the past, we would focus on one core customer—the critically ill. Now, what people want, need and are willing to pay for in terms of care and services depends on age, health and family needs, priorities and preferences. We can no longer design health care services with one consumer in mind. In order to develop a successful consumer facing plan, you need to know and understand the four types of health care consumers:

• Young invincibles: healthy, active community members who are health conscious but are not big users of health services
• Young families: healthy young parents with various health needs for a range of ages
• Healthy adults: established community members who lead active lifestyles but may opt for preventative and elective care and services
• Chronically ill: individuals with chronic diseases that require specialty care and resources 

Next, ask the right questions:

• How can I anticipate and address the SPECIFIC needs of each of these four core customer groups?
• How do these groups traditionally show up in our community? What do I anecdotally know about them and is there historical data I can review to help me understand their engagement patterns?
• How am I going to get them them what they need, where they need it and when they need it at a reasonable cost, at a high level of quality and accessibility?

And if you’re not doing so already, you will want to engage (full tilt) with a database or Customer Relationship Management system to help you better understand your consumers and track and trend their behavior. Your ability to apply analytics and deploy data in your decision making will be critical to your success.

Once you have answered these questions, you should be armed with the information you need to determine the value you can deliver. Here, value can be defined as the ability to provide access to affordable high-quality care and services. Just remember: when it comes to health care and services, value means something different to a 27-year old versus a 50-year old.

At the end of the day, value, and our ability to create it, is the end goal.  If we are to provide our consumers with services that they deem to be of value, we will be well on our way to keep them coming back for more. And once you have answered the value proposition, you will be one step closer to fully realizing consumerism in your organization.

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Next: In the third of this three-part series, I will offer five tips to ensure success in implementing a consumerism plan in your organization.

Give the People What They Want

I recently read a fascinating article in the Wall StreetJournal on the changing model of hospitals and the new ways in which they are beginning to deliver care. As the author, Laura Landro, explains “the sprawling institutions we know are radically changing—becoming smaller, more digital, or disappearing completely. The result should be cheaper and better care.”

As more of my work pushes me into the consumer-focused health care space, I find myself deeply intrigued by Landro’s vision of the future. She defines a new health care landscape where providers are shifting their focus away from their monolithic inpatient facilities. Instead, they’re placing their energy and resources in serving their patients out in the community where they live—moving from an internal service model to an external one. To do this, providers must expand their service lines to offer more outpatient treatment and convenient care options at strategic locations across the regions they serve. In addition, they’re increasing their investment in technology and turning to telehealth (delivery of health care remotely via the internet) to serve more patients in real time.

As the leader of the second largest hospital in Florida, I know the critical importance of a high quality, accessible and traditional health care setting.  But I also believe that health care providers and facilitators will quickly need to adapt to a changing environment that is highly influenced by consumer behavior. Our ability to be nimble and operate in this new space will be critical to our success and survival.

As Landro acknowledges, many of the changes in care delivery are being driven by economics, but they’re also significantly informed by desires of the patient, or as I now refer to them, the health care consumer. In today’s world, consumerism drives our business - and price, quality and convenience are more important than ever. Increased access to technology, the availability of medical information online, and the rise in smartphones, apps and wearable fitness and health devices, are other factors driving consumer-focused health care.

While many of us understand this in theory, how do we begin to think about putting it into practice?

Like everything we do, careful planning and strategy design are critical to success. When developing your consumerism health care plan, consider the following key questions:

• How will you gather and analyze meaningful patient data? Developing insights into patients’ behavior and expectations is vital.
• Have you begun to segment your customer base based on age, risk factors, lifestyle and activity level?
• Which service lines are in the greatest demand within your consumer population and community? Does offering or enhancing these services makes sense to your bottom line and to the consumers you serve?
• Do the spaces for care and treatment center around patients (both their experience and efficiency)?
• Have you considered the ways in which you can holistically integrate all patient management—appointment, tests, etc.?
• Do you have a plan to invest in technology? Technology is a key driver in consumerism. More importantly, patient-facing technology is critical in order to drive digital natives to engage with your health care organization.

There’s no secret sauce in designing and implementing consumer facing health care but there are two key elements to start with. First, you need to work to have the sufficient services available and second, you need to know your customers. This means spending a significant amount of your time developing a deep understanding of your customer base—who they are, what they want and need and what messages resonates with them. At the end of the day, health care is no different than any other business marketing to a defined customer demographic and/or consumer base.

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In my next post I will offer some tips to help make consumerism a reality in your organization.

The Real Thing

I am often asked by young(er) colleagues and folks I mentor, “how do you lead?” My short two-word answer is “like me.” I don’t mean to be glib. What I’m saying is that I practice authentic leadership. I lead as I live. Who I am as a leader is who I am on the golf course, spending time with friends or at home with my family.

I think there are a lot of executives out there who “act” their way through leadership. By this, I mean, they develop a leadership persona that is different from their authentic selves. This doesn’t work for me. I don’t have time to be anyone other than who I am. Over the course of my career, I’ve found that leading authentically has allowed me to be the most effective, satisfied and passionate leader I can be.

You have to first be willing to be yourself in all aspects of your life, including your professional one. Your desire to lead with authenticity is directly tied to your willingness to take the risk to be yourself. The most significant ingredient to success is your ability to share your whole self with others—not just your “office” persona.

Being an authentic leader is also about feeling comfortable in your own skin, owning your leadership style and playing to your strengths. It is also about more than just showing up and being professional. It is about creating lasting relationships and connections with your team and colleagues that are built on trust, honesty and communication. This kind of true synergy enables you to collaborate, achieve your collective goal and face the challenges ahead.

I believe that authentic leadership begins with:

• Enabling trust and inspiring others by being real and transparent
• Owning my mistakes and recasting them as learning opportunities
• Committing to my own self-learning and growth
• Putting my ego aside and working to empower and develop my team

The transformation into an authentic leader does not happen overnight. It’s a process of growth and experience. I would argue, and I hope my colleagues would agree, that I am a better, stronger and more effective leader today than I was 10 years ago.