Turn Workforce Data Into Better Outcomes
Today’s healthcare organizations are moving towards workforce optimization by utilizing strategies that
deliver both quality of care and cost containment. Those strategies require them to use workforce data
in ways they’ve never done before. Automating workforce management processes such as time and
attendance, staffing and scheduling and human resources/payroll is not enough. Instead, forwardthinking health systems are finding new ways to tap into the power of workforce data analytics. A
HealthLeaders survey* of 293 healthcare executives sheds light on strategies that are proving to be
successful to health systems nationwide. Here are the top 5 workforce management initiatives that rated
the highest for labor cost containment and improving care quality.
Productivity
Develop and monitor productivity metrics
Productivity initiatives have a proven track record of impacting both the bottom line and care quality.
The biggest challenges with a productivity initiative typically involve the data analytics. Here’s how one hospital tackled the challenges around setting and measuring the metrics.
Three Tips for Developing Productivity Metrics
Anderson Regional Medical Center in Meridian, MS, has made their workforce management and productivity initiative a priority. That focus yielded $2.5 million in savings in eight months as compared to the previous year. Here are some tips from Vice President of Finance Steven Brown for developing productivity metrics that support success:
- Gain buy-in from managers and staff about why you are doing the productivity initiative, and be sure that your initiative takes both cost and quality into consideration. Then, clearly communicate the project objectives, and allow all stakeholders to share their feedback.
- Work with managers to have a clear understanding of the metric: Make sure everyone understands how and when the volumes will be measured. Be prepared for some negotiation about how the standard is being measured and calculated.
- Give decision-makers the data they need when they need it: Retrospective data is like looking in the rear-view mirror – you can see where you’ve been, but it’s not very helpful for making decisions about what to do now. If you’re going to hold unit managers accountable for productivity, you need to provide them with information for proactive decisions that can have an impact on their unit’s productivity before the shift and pay period are over.
Staffing based on patient needs
Staff based on volumes and patient needs
Staffing based on patient needs is easy to understand in theory but can be hard to put into practice without the right analytics to support data-driven staffing decisions. Patient-centered staffing goes beyond simple nurse-to-patient ratios to ensure that not only are there enough caregivers working to meet patient needs, but that the skill sets and competencies of the nurses and support staff match each patient’s unique needs.
Staff based on volumes and patient needs
Healthcare system executives are moving toward acuity-based staffing to achieve the following outcomes:
- Objective staffing decisions and nurse/patient assignments: Decisions aren’t made based on rules of thumb or “what we’ve always done.” Instead, staffing decisions are driven by patient need and staff skills.
- Care equity: Patients deserve the same level of care, no matter where they are cared for within the healthcare system.
- Equitable nursing workloads: Nurses appreciate balanced workloads that account for how much care each patient needs.
- Account for patient churn: Admits, discharges, and transfers can impact the workload, and it’s important to account for that patient churn.
- Responsive to real-time changes: Decisions aren’t being made retrospectively; instead, adjustments can be done proactively.
- Match nurses’ experience, expertise, and specialization to patient needs: Putting the right patient with the right nurse, every time.
Overtime
Monitor and reduce overtime pay
A systematic approach to reducing overtime has been found to be the most successful way to yield substantial cost savings Health systems can drive down overtime costs through the reduction of projected overtime – making changes to eliminate the overtime before it happens.
Three Key Strategies for Managing Overtime
- Stop overtime before it happens: By integrating time and attendance data with scheduled hours and then applying overtime rules, project overtime and make adjustments before the overtime occurs.
- Focus on the outliers: Often a large percentage of overtime is incurred in just a few units. Focus efforts on understanding why certain units are having more issues with overtime and pinpoint strategies to address those issues.
- A quick win with incidental overtime: Nearly every organization can save tens or even hundreds of thousands of dollars by tackling incidental overtime; those unplanned occurrences that are less than an hour in length. With visibility into incidental overtime, you can see where adjustments to shift change processes or lunch coverage can eliminate that overtime without impacting patient care.
Skill levels/competencies
Adjust the mix
Better management of skill and competency analytics provides both short-term and long-term benefits
In the short term, staffing plans can be based on the optimal skill mix so that staff is deployed to the right place at the right time to balance both care needs and budget constraints while ensuring a positive patient experience. In the long term, decisions can be made to determine how to recruit, retain, and develop a workforce with the right competencies and skills to meet both current and future demands.
Using Skills and Competencies Data for Better Outcomes
Roper St. Francis has developed a system for better tracking of skill and competency data, enabling them to achieve better workforce outcomes. According to Carolyn Donohue, Vice President of Nursing and Chief Nursing Officer at Roper St. Francis Healthcare, “We can track degrees, certifications, and skills in our staffing and scheduling system. That helps us to better balance out the experience, the skills, and the competencies of our staff. With easy access to this information, we can more easily fill our staffing needs from within our own system, not having to always engage in premium labor. That has reduced our need for travelers and agency nurses while providing our staff with opportunities to use their skills in our other hospitals.”
Pennie Peralta, Vice President of Nursing and Chief Nursing Officer at Roper St. Francis Healthcare, adds, “We encourage our nurses to gain new skill sets, and they appreciate opportunities to put those new skills to use. Nurses are lifelong learners, and many of our nurses find it attractive to be able to function in multiple areas. That mindset and ability to embrace change enable us to flex our staff across the entire organization.”
Internal supplemental staf
Utilize part-time, float pool and per diem staff
Developing an internal resource pool can be a cost-effective strategy for using internal resources to fill open shifts in a way that does not compromise the quality of patient care. To achieve the most success, this initiative should focus on analyzing data that reflects patient care needs and staffing holes across the entire enterprise.
Better Analytics = Better Staffing Strategies
A world-class healthcare network, Duke University Health System offers a full network of health services and includes three highly regarded Magnet® hospitals: Duke University Hospital, Duke Regional Hospital, and Duke Raleigh Hospital. With almost 20,000 employees and about 1,450 beds, Duke University Health System is dedicated to providing efficient, outstanding, and effective patient care. Managing a regional float pool that provided services for three hospital facilities and 37 physician practice groups required a new way of thinking and technology that provided the data analytics to support a more sophisticated staffing strategy. By using self-scheduling technology to feed schedules for all three cost centers into one master schedule, now unit assignments better represent patient needs. Organization-wide there is more cost-effective scheduling, reduced incidental overtime, improved employee morale, and consistent scheduling processes across the entire health system.
Julia Bambach, Duke University Health System Strategic Services Associate, explains, “We were looking for a new approach to centralized staffing that would enable us to better utilize our float pool resources. Now, our team in the central staffing office can see staffing needs across the whole organization. That allows us to assign staff to the shift that best fits their availability and qualifications.”
Harnessing Data to Deliver Results
The healthcare workforce is the critical component that links the entire organization’s clinical
and financial imperatives. The HealthLeaders survey found that many of the most effective
workforce management initiatives could be used to drive both labor cost reductions and quality
of care improvements.
Top Workforce Management Initiatives for Labor Cost Reduction
Regarding labor cost reduction, please rank the top three workforce management initiatives
your organization has found to be most successful
Top Workforce Management Initiatives for Labor Cost Reduction
Regarding labor cost reduction, please rank the top three workforce management initiatives
your organization has found to be most successful
Respondent Profile – Employment
Respondent Profile – Title
Better Workforce Outcomes
The HealthLeaders survey shows that developing strategies around workforce data is important to
gaining success for a healthcare organization. As the connecting point between quality of care and cost
containment, the healthcare workforce is one of the largest drivers of both clinical and financial success.
Tracking, managing and analyzing the often disparate reams of data regarding healthcare workers
requires a sophisticated analytics strategy to drive both labor cost containment and quality of care
improvement.
The most effective strategies make it possible to use workforce analytics to ensure that the best decision
for the organization is easy for decision-makers to determine and act upon. With accurate, timely,
actionable data available at all levels of the organization, data-driven workforce management decisions
can be made throughout the organization, from front-line staff and managers to the executive team.
About symplr
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