In all of our lives, both personal and professional, we have been in situations where we have been told to take a step back and look at the situation at hand. Usually when we do step back, we are better able to assess the issue and put forth the appropriate action. What if we did this proactively rather than reactively?
With that said, many organizations develop three to five-year strategic plans and, at the end of a plan's term, measure results to see what objectives were met. Today’s dynamic healthcare environments need more frequent monitoring. Information technology assessments (ITAs) are the checks and balances between IT goal attainment and a wasted initiative. They are the vehicles that transform visions to reality and are multi-purposed to:
- Measure progress against IT strategic plan.
- Measure current needs with current IT offerings.
- Evaluate workflows and technology partnering.
- Consider impacts of newer applications/technologies.
The fact is that smaller organizations can function quite well with yearly assessments in place of long-term IT strategic plans. Even large IDNs are operating with shorter range plans due to the volatility of financing longer range plans in this era of decreasing revenues and, hence, diminishing budgets. In addition, with the bounds of technology constantly expanding, long-range plans may be obsolete before an organization has the opportunity to execute them.
Last week I was talking with my daughter (who is still trying to understand what I do for a living). When the conversation turned to consulting and what it entails, her response was, "No offense, Dad, but why would they listen to you?" Instead of falling backward from the severe blow to my ego, my response to her was that sometimes people just need help organizing their work and thoughts and that I can bring them the structure to do so. Those of you with teenage children can probably guess what kind of response this brought.
It was then that I tried to draw a parallel to something that she could relate to. I proceeded to talk about how she has her life planned out. She has her sights set on a good college, interning for a magazine, graduating near the top of her class, landing a job writing for a national publication and living in NYC. Her "end result" is thus defined some seven years out.
We then discussed the fact that, although she enjoys writing, how would it be doing it for a living? For instance, she went to a creative writing camp at an upstate NY university where she was the youngest in attendance. Upon her completion of the camp program I asked her if she still thought this was her calling. She said that it is. We also have looked at colleges with highly regarded writing programs and are trying to get her involved with local newspapers on a volunteer basis, as well as working for her high school newspaper.
I asked her to look at the process we have undertaken. I then asked her to think about whether or not her long-term plan would be realized if we hadn't assessed the steps we have taken and the progress that we are making. Her response: "Oh, I get it. You hound your customers like you hound me! And they pay you for that?"
What is your organization's approach to reviewing IT needs and assessing overall value? Do you stay the course - or require some "hounding"?
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