Achieving true operational engagement means involving all stakeholders, and refraining from an over-focus on the back office staff. The largest breakdown areas during the conversion process are in the areas that have shared responsibility between clinical departments, finance, and the revenue cycle.

HCB News: For those institutions that are already on a next generation HIS platform, what steps should their revenue cycle team take to realize the full ROI of the platform?

JM: Right now we’re seeing trends within the post-implementation environment where organizations attack process improvement with a break/fix ticket model, a patchwork approach that does not promote higher-level decision-making.

That higher-level decision-making is crucial to post-implementation results, though. The foundation for achieving all aspects of continuous revenue cycle improvement begins with a dedicated focus to several core initiatives. To reduce system inefficiencies and bottlenecks, organizations need a well-defined “ownership” of responsibilities among disparate teams and exception-based workload management. Just as important are clearly defined productivity standards in the new paradigm, user and management reporting independence, and the empowerment of operations to drive ongoing system improvement.

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