Marketing Can Lead the C-suite to Smarter Healthcare Delivery

"He who rejects change is the architect of decay." - Harold Wilson

Transforming an organization’s culture from facility-centered to patient-centered has clearly achieved mandate status for traditional healthcare delivery models as the aftermath of a pandemic unfolds. It’s also become a major roadblock and frustration for you as a marketer to lead the C-suite to evolve organization thinking and action enough to compete with retail and other new business disruptors.

A solid, forward-thinking organization cultural foundation is essential to execute real transformative customer-driven work, and marketing with new tech tools and data has a specific role to play as a change agent in the effort to truly improve the patient experience. Here's a framework.

With a saturation of attention on patient journey and experience, many organizations are looking at new roles like Chief Experience Officers, or Chief Engagement Officers. This feels like window dressing with a clear attachment to the old mantra of marketing fixing problems in organizations.

The real evolution of patient-centered experience must come from within. To fix the patient journey, a supergroup comprised of clinical operations, marketing, IT, and finance as a start must all be joined to build a collaborative mechanism to separate the organization from its competition using service and experience as the main barometer – eliminating disconnects in the patient journey, driving business growth, brand loyalty and an enhanced patient experience.

This collaboration must be ingrained into the cultural fabric of the organization while marketing content and execution begin to speak to customers very differently. Fulfilling their healthcare needs in a concerted and connected way will send an important message to consumers, to the organization -- and with a true champion at the helm -- can unfold an evolutionary culture shift within the organization.

As a co-equal partner in this group, marketing leadership requires a personal strategic resolve to advocate for investments in MarTech AND talent. As many traditional healthcare organizations struggle with the integration of this new dynamic, the constant challenge to gain traction against competitive disruptors can lead to brand erosion and slower growth. Panic then sets in and patience to allow those investments to work is lost. For marketing to deliver its unique value, the team must be able to quickly and effectively harness a suite of technologies that are highly interconnected to the people, processes, and capabilities of an organization. And therein sits the disconnect and failure today.

The reality is about half the organization will eventually support and buy in to change thinking. Yet with mounting outside pressure on healthcare organizations coming from all angles, C-suite leadership remains handcuffed to gain any traction toward a fully integrated, operational marketing approach. Why? Many reasons. Over the years, getting bigger and continuation of the need to grow business for demographic leverage has hurt organization culture tremendously. Now, with newer, more convenient, and accessible players in the healthcare space, the traditional organization may just be too big to turn.

Those who have worked through this challenge stand ready to engage. With the right management leadership coupled with strong clinical leadership – all operating without fear of change – the path to navigate is there. Yes, there will be bumps in the road. Yet real-life examples in healthcare organizations show it’s doable and evolving. The mandate for cultural change is real. Who will survive and who will be commoditized?