Hospital-Physician Alignment Solution

The need for hospital executives and physicians to work together has never been more urgent. Our experience suggests, and we believe many hospital CEOs agree, hospitals with high levels of physician alignment are more successful in many performance dimensions than those with lower alignment. Yet, as our recent report suggests, many CEOs are not fully satisfied with the current levels of alignment in their organizations. 

Hospitals and health systems embarking on major initiatives of all types will benefit from careful consideration of physician alignment and the cultural dimensions of change. The demand for improved coordination of patient care, both during and after a stay, is just one example of the external pressure on hospitals for improved outcomes at lower cost. Accomplishing such goals will require re-engineered clinical and operational processes that stretch physicians, leadership, and other staff to think and act in new ways.  Designing and implementing these processes will require commitment by all parties—a level of commitment that cannot be achieved without well-conceived strategies to improve physician alignment. Those organizations that most effectively address alignment and culture are likely to be the most successful in execution of such initiatives.

How Thomas Group Can Help

Thomas Group understands how to improve physician alignment in healthcare organizations, as well as how to leverage the impact of improved alignment on your critical initiatives.

At Thomas Group, we take the term physician alignment to imply:

  • Common understanding of mission and vision
  • Agreement on key goals and objectives
  • Consensus on critical priorities
  • Commitment to focus resources on those priorities
  • A culture that supports continuous improvement and change

We understand that no two organizations are at exactly the same place in this journey. Although many of the underlying issues are common, each organization is faced with its own unique challenges. Our solutions build off our experience in hospital-physician alignment to create a custom roadmap tailored to your specific needs.

Our structured approach includes:

  • Gaining a thorough understanding of your organizational goals and strategies;
  • Assessing the current level of physician alignment through a variety of tools;
  • Identifying the hot buttons for your physicians;
  • Working with hospital leadership and physicians to achieve consensus on a manageable number of critical priorities;
  • Developing win-win goals and strategies around these priorities;
  • Creating a collaborative implementation framework within which physicians and administration can work together;
  • Designing and executing a detailed game plan to achieve the defined goals.

At the heart of improved physician alignment is a collaborative effort between the institution’s leadership and its physicians to build an environment of mutual trust, win-win goals, and a culture of openness.

To read the Executive Summary of our recent Hospital-Physician Alignment Survey report, click here. For more information or to request the full report, please email health@thomasgroup.com and include your name, organization, and phone number.