THE IRELAND REPORT ON SUCCEEDING IN WOMEN'S HEALTH, 1998
© The Ireland Corporation, 1998. All Rights Reserved.

Women's Health Knowledge-Base: Lessons Learned
by Richard C. Ireland

The following Women=s Health Knowledge-Base is our compilation of lessons learned by women=s health professionals in the pursuit of developing and managing their own successful programs. So in this article we take a look at some of the knowledge gained by women=s health professionals through their hands-on experiences. It is based on our site visits to women=s health programs, success profiles from The Ireland Report, consulting assignments, feedback from Snowmass Institute participants and Ireland Report subscribers, and ongoing literature and Internet searches.

Knowledge is information that has a high strategic value in solving a problem and/or achieving success in developing a program. Of course, not all knowledge will have high value in every situation and over time it can become stale and lose its value. It also includes wisdom and insight.

Knowledge resides in many forms throughout an organization. It is contained in reports, manuals, case studies, medical records, information systems, and the minds of individuals. Indeed, knowledge management is now viewed as one the most important ways that an organization can sustain its competitive advantage, develop innovative programs, and stay financially viable.

Keeping a knowledge-base is a very effective way to track the knowledge generated in the key areas of women=s health and to stay ahead of your markets and competition.

The challenge, of course, is to weigh your own lessons learned experience against this knowledge-base to find an optimal mix of lessons for your situation.

You will probably agree that many of the lessons learned below are common sense components but they must not be forgotten C even if they are obvious to you. Other lessons are very innovative. Remember C the significance of the following is that all are mentioned frequently by women=s health professionals and in the literature. Many, many women's health leaders will tell you it is an agonizing mistake to assume that anything is 'just a given' C understood without putting it in writing. It is not! Incorporate even the obvious into your plan/goals. That said, we will share the core items we have gleaned from our knowledge-base (not listed in order of priority):

1. Everything is temporary, change is a way of life, go with the flow. Don=t let the nay sayers get you down.

2. Create an operating definition of women=s health as it pertains to your organization. Who will you serve? What are their needs? What scope of services will you offer?

3. Work hard to secure an organizational commitment to women=s health through a well documented strategic/marketing plan, timely presentations and feedback, one-to-one relationships, high involvement of key constituencies, and intensive cross-marketing. Women=s health must be a total commitment, not just a marketing strategy.

4. Align your women=s health program with the organization=s strategic plan: mission, vision, values, and key initiatives. Understand how women=s health supports your organization=s goals and initiatives.

5. Adopt a service line model for women=s health.

6. Develop a comprehensive approach to women=s health. Focus on developing services for the total woman. Remember you don=t have to own the service to offer it. This is what cross-marketing

7. Secure physician collaboration and support early and often.

8. Consider your women=s health program a business enterprise that serves both the women=s health market and your organization.

9. Develop a one-stop shopping approach to women=s health. This includes placing related services in one area, coordinating with all key services, offering immediate feedback, offering a high level of convenience and access. The major one-stop areas include: obstetrics, outpatient services, gynecology, and information/referral/education services. All are coordinated and cross-marketed.

10. Recognize very early on that you are likely to experience a competitive reaction to what you are doing. It can come from other providers, physicians, new market entries, managed care.

11. Develop a network of champions (physicians, senior management, community, service line leaders/department heads). Make sure that your champions can communicate with each other. Provide continuous feedback on your activities and progress, formally and informally.

12. Demonstrate fiscal responsibility:

13. Develop a health information and referral resource center for women and their families. A resource center is the cornerstone or portal for your women=s health program. The key is to locate it near a high traffic area, market aggressively to physicians, and use aggressive signage.

14. Invest in relationship management. Emphasize Ashare of customer@ or Ashare of household@ C not just market share. It places the focus on both acquisition and retention of customers. It is customer-driven and personalized. In women=s health, relationship management uses membership, database/mail list development, customer service representatives, case managers, follow-up communications, and referral services.

15. Know your customer. Continually assess your market through research such as focus groups, consumer surveys, program evaluations, patient satisfaction, customer service feedback, feedback from champions and committees, demographic analysis, and personal observation.

16. Focus on customer service in everything you and your staff do:

17. Develop an active and diversified community advisory board. It is crucial that each member of the advisory board understand their role, meet regularly, be kept informed, and actively participate in relationship management.

18. Know how to aggressively cross-market to all service lines, departments, programs, centers, and physician practices across your hospital and health system. Always take the initiative.

19. Develop a retail strategy for women=s services. Focus on a boutique strategy. Be comprehensive and include lactation, personal image services and products, prostheses products, healthcare items such as books, even gifts. The key is location, great merchandising, and aggressive marketing.

20. Develop an aggressive and comprehensive educational program. Remember that this is one of the key ways to get women and their families involved with your program. Offer two or three Abell-ringer@ programs per year, organize programs as 3-5 part curriculums such as mind-body andparenting classes, track your enrollments, track what others are doing, use community involvement and sites, cross-market everything.

21. Keep your focus on the Ahot spot@ opportunities in women=s health. Continually search for opportunity. A few of the knowledge-base Ahot spots@ worth tracking are:

22. Follow your market. You can find opportunity everywhere. Pay attention to your own Abackyard.@ Look for opportunity with:

23. Develop a Akiller@ web site for women=s health. Organize as Aportal@ to women=s health information and services. Provide the key linkages to other sites and access to newsletters.

24. Develop a comprehensive network of support groups. Every organization has them but does not always manage them as a core part of women=s health or other service lines. Consider developing online support groups with linkages to key resources and national support networks, health associations, and chat sites.

25. Create a multidisciplinary service development team that searches for and evaluates service opportunities.

26. Develop ongoing partnerships and strategic alliances with community organizations, schools, employers, and women=s organizations. Focus on groups that also target women.

Based on the frequency that each of the above Alessons learned@ were documented as well as the value attached to their importance in creating a successful women=s health program, the ten core Alessons learned@ are (again not listed in order of priority):

1. Demonstrate fiscal responsibility.

2. Invest in relationship management.

3. Know your customer.

4. Adopt a service line model for women=s health.

5. Develop a one-stop shopping approach to women=s health.

6. Develop a comprehensive approach to women=s health.

7. Focus on customer service in everything you and your staff do.

8. Know how to aggressively cross-market your services.

9. Align your women=s health program with the organization=s strategic plan.

10. Develop a network of champions (physicians, senior management, community, service line leaders/department heads).

Creating your own women=s health knowledge-base is an effective way of documenting what you know and learning how to manage your knowledge to create a sustainable competitive advantage. This should lead you to more effectively serving your women=s health market. You can keep a journal, use a database program, use Lotus Notes, or keep it on index cards. Once you begin to actively keep a knowledge-base, your intuitive sense of women=s health will increase, along with your success.

Do you have a Alesson learned@ that is not included in the above list? If you do, please send it to us via email: snowinst@eazy.net and we will be sure to add it to our Women=s Health Knowledge-Base.

Richard Ireland is President of The Ireland Corporation/The Snowmass Institute, Centennial, Colorado. He may be reached at snowinst@eazy.net

From the November/December 1998 issue of The Ireland Report on Succeeding in Women's Health

© The Ireland Corporation, 1998. All Rights Reserved.

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