Self-Service Analytics Drive $300K in Labor Cost Savings

Leaders Need Data to Understand Performance

Most health systems struggle with getting relevant, timely information to department leaders and executives to enable data-driven decisions. The lack of accessible information typically results in 1) leaders sending multiple ad hoc report requests to the Decision Support or Analytics team, 2) leaders making decisions without a full understanding of root causes and the likely impact, or 3) the Decision Support team producing and distributing multiple, disparate reports to decision makers that users have difficulty understanding and often don’t use.

A large, multi-site healthcare system in Texas was experiencing this problem. The Decision Support team was overwhelmed with data requests despite the routine reports they created manually and sent out monthly. Leaders were doing their own analyses without a full understanding of the data and without a 360 degree view of the problem. The Decision Support team was incredibly busy supporting end users, but leaders were not getting what they needed to make sound decisions.

Provide Self-Service Analytics for Your Organization

Using StrataJazz, the Decision Support team created a more efficient and cost effective process to provide leaders the information they need to manage performance and ultimately reduce cost while increasing quality.

Before Strata, regional finance teams produced their own daily indicator reports for entity and department leaders. The metrics on the reports varied from region to region. Often, the data sources and calculations differed as well. The regional reports didn’t align with the information reported at a corporate level. If the leaders needed deeper information, they would have to request data from finance.

Despite a strong process for driving accountability for performance throughout the system, too much time was spent debating the data and doing deep-dive analysis rather than focusing on how to improve performance. Unfortunately, this well-intended monthly financial reporting process required approximately 15 hours per month for each of 8 regional finance associates.

Corporate and regional leadership needed standardized reporting built on trusted data, shared KPIs, and targets. With Strata’s help, this organization standardized KPIs across the system and built corporate, regional, entity, and department dashboards that aligned performance throughout the large and growing health system. The team built intuitive drill-ins to allow for seamless, self-service deeper dive information. Certified Super-Users throughout the health system could access ad hoc reporting tools to answer questions for regional leaders.

Automated, Standardized Report Saved $290k in Labor Costs

By creating a standard set of KPIs and reports in a single “source of truth” database, the monthly report creation process went from 8 people spending 15 hours per month to 1 person spending 30 minutes per month to review the reports for accuracy. This meant the organization could reduce 120 hours per month to 30 minutes and spend 1550 hours on high-value projects per year, transforming 26 entities with aligned, standard and self-service reports.

The organization was able to reduce full-time labor cost for a savings of $300K per year and deploy remaining team members on higher value work. The organization now makes data-driven decisions across expansive geography and is strengthening its culture of accountability and growth. Further, they have redirected around 1500 hours per year to high-value projects.