Change Management

Making it easier to recognize the good ideas

Excellus BlueCross BlueShield

The complex decisions that shape the course of action for an enterprise—about technology, products and services, and projects—are not made lightly. For some organizations, underperforming evaluation methods can threaten to stop those decisions from being made at all. 

Challenge

Business unit management and project sponsors at Excellus BlueCross BlueShield, the largest nonprofit health insurance provider in New York State, were frustrated with the enterprise method for evaluating new ideas for technology, products and services. With a $75+ million mission critical project portfolio, effective and efficient consideration of multi-million dollar incremental, architectural, and disruptive innovations was essential to the future growth of the organization and the satisfaction of stakeholders and customers.

Thinking

Gather process performance data then analyze to gain greater insight into the situation and establish a baseline for evaluating the outcome of an improvement initiative. Deliver a customer satisfaction surveys to the process users and key stakeholders to evaluate process factors such as tools, education, and resources and identify the primary pain point. Conduct time studies to determine the actual process cycle times and operational costs.

Solution

The research identified an inventory of pain points and helped prioritize the action plan for improvements based on the primary pain point. A cross-functional project team was activated to remove a redundant process milestone and develop a new initiation tool removing the primary pain point while increasing the quality of concept data for the governing board. A change management plan featuring internal communication and education plans was launched to ensure awareness, acceptance, and continuity in training for process users and stakeholders.

Impact

  • Nearly $100,000 estimated total annual administrative savings
  • 58% decrease in process cycle time [baseline: new process cycle time 5- vs. 12-days]
  • 56% increase in overall process user satisfaction [baseline: 14% satisfied with old process]
  • 100% of process users and stakeholders were engaged and educated on new process
  • Increasing employee satisfaction and speed to market while decreasing operational expenses = priceless