Post-Pandemic, 60% are Undertaking New Multi-Year Transformation Projects
Boston, MA – May 24, 2022 – UpperEdge, an independent third-party advisory company that empowers organizations to get the most value from their IT supplier relationships, created a unique set of criteria for healthcare companies to evaluate two leading ERP providers, Oracle and Workday.
As a result of operational challenges due to the pandemic, healthcare providers are being tasked with improving operational efficiencies, reducing costs, and hiring and retaining skilled workers, which is accelerating their ERP cloud migration plans.
According to the BDO 2021 Healthcare Digital Transformation Survey, 60% of healthcare companies are adding new digital projects, while 42% are accelerating some or all of their digital transformation plans.
Making mistakes up front can be costly. Setting a healthcare company up for success is especially complex due to multi-faceted strains on the business, such as:
- Maintaining Profitability. More than one-third of hospitals had negative margins in 2021.
- Preserving Liquidity. Payments from insurers have been delayed, COVID subsidies are ending, medical costs are increasing, and patients are experiencing more financial pressures and insurance gaps.
- Supply Chain Issues. 80% of hospitals and health systems are experiencing supply shortages.
- Regulatory Concerns. Several regulatory policies are on the horizon, like drug pricing regulations, price transparency and enhanced enforcement of anti-competitive behavior.
- Technology Strategy. Different systems and applications must be unified to improve patient convenience and efficiency, financial automation, workforce management, and cybersecurity.
With Oracle and Workday keenly targeting the healthcare industry, the challenge for healthcare providers is how to conduct a thorough cloud ERP evaluation while working under added timeline pressure and facing highly aggressive sales tactics from Oracle and Workday.
The process begins with having clearly defined project goals and success measurements, then identifying the business process requirements to achieve these goals, and then having the vendors map their products to your requirements and conducting product demos.
“The healthcare industry has many legacy systems, and these types of digital transformation initiatives are generational in nature, comprised of team members that have very little experience conducting these types of evaluations and negotiations. Team members also tend to be juggling multiple responsibilities leading to significant time constraints. This creates an uneven playing field in favor of Oracle and Workday,” according to Jeff Lazarto, Commercial Advisory Practice Leader at UpperEdge.
“The process of preparing for a competitive sourcing process, evaluating vendors and solutions, matching healthcare requirements to solution capabilities, contrasting pricing methodologies, and defining the elements of a strong commercial deal can be daunting,” Lazarto added.
UpperEdge will provide a framework and offer insights into getting a handle on these issues in a webinar, “Healthcare ERP Transformation – How to Evaluate Oracle vs. Workday,” on June 8th at 11:00 EDT. Register at https://bit.ly/3wzjilg and you will be sent the recording even if you cannot attend.
About UpperEdge
UpperEdge maximizes the value its clients receive from their key IT supplier relationships by helping them develop and execute fact-based sourcing, negotiation, and program execution strategies. Visit www.upperedge.com for more information.
