Outsourcing
Are you ready to give up control?
As healthcare providers look to cut expenditure and maximise efficiency, outsourcing has become increasingly common. Perhaps you are currently considering outsourcing components of your own healthcare services?
While organisations are typically hesitant to outsource services directly related to clinical care, many look to outsource cleaning and laundry services, food services, and even call centre services. What many fail to recognise is that all these services are in fact patient-facing. This means any provider you choose will interact with your patients on your organisation’s behalf.
By entrusting a third party to engage with your patients, you are giving up control of aspects of the patient experience. You’re also giving up control of your reputation. Before making the decision to outsource any service, you need to ask yourself: Am I confident in their ability to absorb and present our organisational values through their work, with and for our patients?
The Impacts of Outsourcing
50
Percent of outsourcing relationships fail within five years
80
Percent of Hospital Managers believed that the outsourcing services would not save money and would create some risks to patient care.
70
Percent of outsourcing partnerships in healthcare fail to meet their intended goals
The real cost of outsourcing
Outsourcing is not a silver bullet for healthcare organisations looking to cut costs – though it is often perceived as such. When not implemented correctly, outsourcing can adversely impact your revenue. For outsourcing to have a positive impact on your organisation, it must be implemented for the right reasons.
Before outsourcing any of your organisation’s services, you need to be aware of all the risks and carefully weigh the pros and cons. Viewing outsourcing simply to cut expenditure ignores the larger impact outsourcing might have on your organisation, including patients and staff. At its worst, outsourcing can lead to inconsistencies in service quality, privacy and data breaches, increased staff turnover, and a subpar patient experience. Each of these outcomes can be very damaging to your organisation’s reputation. They can also adversely impact your revenue – despite your initial motivation to cut costs.
When is outsourcing really worth it?
To achieve the desired outcome, all outsourcing partnerships need to be built on a solid foundation. Identifying the services where outsourcing would genuinely add value is crucially important. After selecting the services, each prospective partner must be carefully vetted. For the partnership to then succeed, establishing clearly defined ground rules and follow up processes is essential.
Studies have shown that around 50% of outsourcing relationships fail within five years. One of the most common reasons for terminating an outsourcing contract is unmet expectations. Even if a supplier is not meeting your expectations, exiting an outsourcing agreement prematurely can be very complicated and expensive. You will then be faced with a catch 22: do you stay in an unsatisfying partnership even though it’s hurting operations, or do you terminate the contract knowing the process will cost you time and money?
Are you seeking to optimise your healthcare delivery through outsourcing but need to know if you’re doing it for the right reasons or implementing it effectively? With the help of our unique methods, together we can look to understand outsourcing’s place in your healthcare delivery. This will allow you to ensure that outsourcing is done for the right reasons and implemented correctly. We aim to drive positive change in your outsourcing arrangements and devise strategies to transform ineffective partnerships.
