7 Innovation Keywords from the CFO Exchange

What does innovation really mean to you? We asked the members of the HealthLeaders CFO Exchange for their innovation keywords.

Innovation has become such an overused word in healthcare leadership that leaders must further define what the term means to their organization. At the 2017 HealthLeaders CFO Exchange, members were asked to define what innovation means to them and their organizations.

Disruption: "I would use the word disruption—not in the usual sense of talking about other organizations coming into a market—but in the sense that we have to do something different," said Rick Hinds, executive vice president and CFO of UC Health in Cincinnati, Ohio.

Lacking: "We are lacking innovation as an industry," said Michael Browning, CFO of ProMedica Health System in Toledo, Ohio.

"As individual organizations, some of us are being innovative, but as an industry we tend to be more status quo.  Many organizations are continuing to hold on to the historical healthcare models, and they are not taking risk and being innovative."

ProMedica has made the difficult strategic decision to invest in innovation for the long term, Browning says.

"Many people think that they cannot be innovative because it does not have an initial return on investment. Innovation can have a return on investment, but the return make take longer to materialize."

"Our board understands the importance of being an innovative organization and they support this investment. So, when you ask about margin and whether the ability to generate a margin hurts innovation at ProMedica, it doesn't. … Our board will say, 'Continue to invest even if we are running a financial deficit because we believe in the strategy and what you are doing.' They know the dollars are coming down the road."

Lean: "My one innovative word for our organization is lean," said Mary Ann Freas, senior vice president and CFO of Southwest General Health Center, Middleburg Heights, Ohio.

"It's the way we approach our delivery of services, and it applies to promoting ease of access to our services, the patient experience when it comes to access, coordination of care, and patient safety and quality."

"As we think through any improvements, we think through the process and how we can take waste out."

"Whether we are looking at how to increase access to our services or how to reduce sepsis, it really is a general concept of taking a look at the process, then finding duplication and unnecessary steps."

Passion: "We align passion behind what we are doing. We have a very disciplined, high-performance healthcare model that we follow every year on the calendar," said Randy Van Straten, vice president of business health at Bellin Health in Green Bay, Wisconsin.

"We study the voice of our customers, our patients, our physicians, our employees, and our insurers. Every year, we go through and we evaluate our mission, our vision, and our strategic objectives. Then we narrow down to focus on three breakthroughs, so we can align our resources. Otherwise there is too much competition for resources."

Risky: "There is so much innovation, especially when you look to technology. Everyone has a new technology tool coming out. But some of these technologies do not work, or some of them do not have anywhere near the effectiveness they claim that they have," said Garrick Stoldt, CFO of Saint Peter's Healthcare System in New Brunswick, New Jersey.

"For me, there are so many things that are being developed right now, and you only have limited resources; so, if you pick the wrong bets, you waste a lot of resources unnecessarily and end up with no resources for the right bet."

Risk-Tolerance: "If you pursue the idea du jour and if you are struggling with a 2% to 3% margin, if you make one mistake, you can end up upside down. It is not easy to get out once you are in—putting your toe in the water is just not doable in most situations," said Richard Rothberger, executive vice president and CFO of Scripps Health in San Diego, California.

"I am most concerned about too many initiatives, the lack of bandwidth to handle them, and picking the right one for the organization that will make a difference."

Transformational: "You have to look at everything you have done in the past and make adaptations. We have created an innovation department, and that includes investing in start-ups. We have started investing in start-ups for future growth," said Mike Simms, vice president of revenue cycle at Cone Health in Greensboro, North Carolina.

"To be transformational in revenue cycle, you must look at your technology and how you interact with patients, because they want the same experience that they have with the airlines and other industries. They want to have self-service on a web portal. They want to create payment plans on their own, and not have to call into a customer service department. You have to be transformational and willing to change."