LIVE from the MUSE Executive Institute: New Year in Newport
One of the best parts of my job is that I get to build relationships with people. Not just people that I work, but with our customers and other vendors in the healthcare community. Earlier this month, Art Nicholas and I were able to immerse ourselves in a great community of MEDITECH EHR hospitals at the 2024 Muse Executive Institute.
The Executive Institute is a smaller event, with IT executives from about 20 hospitals who come together for educational sessions and reverse tradeshows with HIT vendors like Interlace Health.
This year’s theme was “Solving Workforce Challenges” and the executives in attendance also served as the session leaders. This provides invaluable insight into “how the other guys are doing it” for the CIOs, VPs of Information Systems and Medical Directors of Informatics who are in the audience. Hospital executives are facing similar workforce challenges across the country, and this event allowed them to share their solutions with each other. Some of the questions answered in the presentations were:
• How do you do more with less?
• How do you manage staffing issues?
• How do you measure productivity?
• Do you innovate, automate, or find AI solutions?
The session that I felt most creatively addressed these questions was titled “Personality & Productivity – Staffing the Seats on the Bus” by Kingman Regional Medical Center leaders Brett Mello, CIO and Dr. William Gustin, Director of Medical Informatics. Mr. Mello and Dr. Gustin led the group in an insightful session that focused on evaluating the alignment of staff personality with role expectations for each position in the department. Demands on IT departments are unrelenting, and many hospitals are facing increased project requests with reduced staff and budgets. The personality & productivity exercise was geared at maximizing department productivity, one individual at a time. This approach allows leaders to identify and reconcile misplaced personalities that are having a negative impact on IT workflow and culture.
One of my favorite lines from Mr. Mello’s presentation was “Culture eats strategy for breakfast”. It’s an adage we have all heard before, but it really resonated with me as I am working with my organization to determine the best strategies to meet our goals for the year. Taking the time to ensure you have the right people in the right positions to influence the cultural shift towards the change and success you desire is just as important as the strategy itself, maybe even more so.
Over the two days, there are many opportunities talk with and get to know each other better. These conversations provided insight into the challenges hospital IT leaders are facing in the year ahead, which helps me work with my organization to try and find ways to support them. A few common themes I heard were
- Preparing for cyber security attacks. It’s not a matter of “if” it’s a matter of “when” and you need to be prepared when it happens.
- Prioritizing digital technologies to improve the patient experience, enhance data collection and automate workflows for overwhelmed staff.
- Patient portal improvements and adjustments. Patients are still slow to adopt the portal, but what are the other options to digitize the administrative process for staff?
- Getting creative with the technology that you have in place today to solve other problems when budgets are tight.
My favorite part of the trip was spending time with our customers and hearing what they like most about working with Interlace Health, check out some videos below we captured.
What our Customers are saying at the MUSE Executive Institute
Tito Perez, Corporate Director of Enterprise Applications at Emanate Health
Eric Gasser, VP/CIO at Wooster Community Hospital
Kelly Lippold, Director of Health Informatics at NMC Health
Jeff Goad, CIO at Williamson Medical Center
The Muse Executive Institute is a wonderful opportunity to connect with the MEDITECH community, learn more about their successes and challenges, and discover new ways Interlace Health can continue to enhance MEDITECH for our customers. I look forward to next year!
ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Dessiree Paoli, Director of Product Marketing & Strategy at Interlace Health
Dessiree Paoli is the Director of Product Marketing & Strategy at Interlace Health, a company that transforms workflows by providing clinicians and patients with digital healthcare solutions. She has more than 20 years of experience in driving strategic marketing initiatives, leading teams, and developing integrated campaigns, and she has worked in healthcare for more than 14 years. Connect with Dessiree on LinkedIn.
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