HEALING HEALTHCARE: USING MANAGED SERVICES TO HEAL AN IT HEALTHCARE COMPANY'S WORKFORCE ILLS

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ROI BY THE NUMBERS

  • 16 WEEK implementation project timeline.
  • 1 MILLION in first-year hard savings, more than 10% of total spend.
  • 2 MILLION in first-year soft savings, more than 10% of total spend.

SOLUTIONS YOH PROVIDED

  • Managed Service Provider
  • Vendor Management System

Degree of Difficulty

  • 8/10
  • 15,000+ employees across 100+ countries
  • $20 million time and materials spend required significant reduction
  • Short timeline
The Dilemma

Despite its highly advanced technology and analytics, there was still one number into which a leading information, services and technology healthcare company needed greater insight in order to remain a leader. The number? Its $20 million time and materials spend. Company executives lacked visibility and oversight of this number and couldn’t quickly or effectively pinpoint where it was going, who it was going to, or why.

The Strategy

Yoh began to work closely with the client to design and execute an accelerated Managed Service Provider (MSP) sales cycle. Tasked with helping bring new structure and visibility into the firm’s time and materials spend, Yoh integrated its expert MSP and vendor management system (VMS) programs into the underpinnings of the client’s workforce planning.

The Effect

Over the first year of the MSP program, Yoh helped the client cut its spend by 10 percent – a savings of more than $2 million ($1 million of which was hard savings). The accelerated launch of the program that Yoh made possible helped the client realize that savings more quickly – a key end-value, as time equals innovation.

PUBLISHING INDUSTRY FAST FACTS

$8,600 per capita spent on healthcare in U.S.

43% of physicians use mobile health technology for clinical purposes

20% increase in number of U.S. health IT jobs expected from 2008 to 2018

$765 BILLION in wasted healthcare costs each years

The healthcare technology space was built on its ability to find new efficiencies and refocus time and resources on advancing critical healthcare innovations. Yoh’s client, a leader in the industry, has spent the past 60 years doing just that.

Uniquely positioned at the popular intersection of healthcare and technology, helping merge these two industries as they become ever more interdependent, the client compiles and crunches massive amounts of data on diseases, treatments and healthcare outcomes. It processes billions of healthcare transactions each year for its more than 5,000 clients, from providers and payers to pharmaceutical and medical device manufacturers to government agencies and policymakers.

But despite its highly advanced technology and analytics, there was still one number into which the client needed greater insight in order to remain a leader in this space. And that number is the $20 million time and materials spend. Company leaders were unclear as to both why this number was as high as it was and who was even taking from it.

The realization of this overlooked spend came at a critical time for the company. Owned by a private equity firm with a laser focus on optimizing savings and maximizing value, the client needed to streamline its time and materials spend and continue providing leading information, services and technology in a cost-effective and efficient manner for clients. In order to do this, the company would have to gain complete visibility into its contingent workforce.

Why the Typical Solution Wasn't Going to Work

After setting out to find a solution, the company realized that a managed service provider (MSP) was needed in order to really get the program – and spend – back on track. But the company also knew that kind of program can be hard to roll out on a tight timeline driven by the needs of a parent organization. Typically, organizations adopt a structured approach of selecting and developing an MSP program, and it’s often a complex process that requires company-wide buy-in. The complete journey from RFP to live program can take as long as a year. But time is money, and Yoh’s client wanted an MSP service up and running as soon as possible to maximize savings and more closely track total spend before competitors took over market share in its space.

During the time the company was having these internal discussions, Yoh had been brought in by the parent private equity firm to discuss technology staff for the firm’s subsidiary companies, including the client. The more the firm worked with Yoh, the more the relationship evolved as Yoh introduced innovative solutions for a wide range of challenges the company was facing.

Through this transparent and collaborative relationship, Yoh developed a strong partnership with the firm, becoming a trusted advisor through its continuous effort of streamlining workforce programs. Seeing the value and results Yoh was achieving, the company moved quickly and handed the reins of the MSP program to Yoh.

Numbers on screen

How to Accelerate MSP Implementation without Sacrificing Your Goals

Working in conjunction with the client, Yoh focused on efficiency and quality talent acquisitions, managing staffing suppliers to quickly deliver and oversee contingent labor processes. The VMS solution, combined with the accelerated MSP sales cycle, also helped the company see the big picture - how much is spent, which vendors are performing best, how many contingent workers are active, what roles they play and beyond.

That $20 million black hole? It quickly started to dissipate.

Over the first year of the MSP program, Yoh helped the client eliminate more than $2 million in unnecessary spending. Through the quickly paced program launch that 10% savings was discovered sooner than expected, allowing the client the time and money needed to focus more on its core innovation objectives.

The Next Step: Extending the Efficiencies

Yoh’s management of the time and materials spend created efficiencies so quickly that the client decided to institute another MSP program for its Statement of Work (SOW) business, again handing the program’s management over to Yoh.

While the acceptance and execution of the two MSP solutions happened quickly compared to the typical MSP engagement, it certainly didn’t happen by chance. Yoh worked diligently with the client to define its savings goals and contingent labor needs, ensuring the results met the top-level goals of the C-suite from day one through to its current state.

Why MSP was the Key

This high-touch, consultative approach Yoh took with this project allowed the client to better communicate its savings goals, and craft an MSP program that not only fit its needs and offered the oversight it wanted, but realized cost savings even beyond what was anticipated.

The client is a global leader in compiling and making sense of complex healthcare data, and having an MSP featuring strict oversights and controls allowed the company to focus on data collection and analysis rather than internal inefficiencies and financial leakages – allowing them to focus more on their jobs, leaving the rest to us.

Now, the client is able to distribute thousands of data points to medical experts and others throughout the world, better serving its own internal stakeholders, as well as its clients. Today, the client is the world’s leading information services and technology company making healthcare perform better.

By working alongside Yoh in employing a tailored MSP solution, the two organizations were able to identify and classify the current and future challenges, and developed a solution that would increase oversight, better realize savings, and provide visibility the company never had access to before.