Q&A with Excelerant's Darby Thompson; Poll finds 23% of healthcare workers likely to leave; plus Jobs!

March 4, 2022

Hello NAW Subscribers -

I hope you like this issue of National Accounts Weekly!

Please enjoy the interview with Darby Thompson of Excelerant Consulting. It was good catching up with him.

And finally, JHC is looking for top non-acute and alternate site supply chain leaders for its annual feature. Please nominate them here.

Sincerely,

John Pritchard

President of ANAE

Publisher of The Journal of Healthcare Contracting

Nominate top non-acute supply chain leaders

The Journal of Healthcare Contracting (JHC) is seeking your nominations for Top Non-Acute and Alternate Site Supply Chain Leaders. Non-acute facilities are playing an integral role in today’s care delivery and JHC would like to highlight their particular challenges and successes. The leaders will be featured in an upcoming JHC issue and interviewed in a JHC podcast series.

Nominees can be in an exclusive non-acute supply chain role or a role connecting non-acute care with the acute care supply chain.

Nominate Here

Q&A: Darby Thompson of Excelerant Consulting

Darby Thompson, a partner with Excelerant Consulting, joined John Pritchard for a conversation about his background and what national account executives can do for the healthcare industry in 2022. He also shared some of his passions outside of his job.

Find the entire interview here.

John Pritchard: Darby, please summarize your industry background and the role you're in today.

Darby Thompson (Partner, Excelerant Consulting): Thanks, John. My background is fairly diverse. I started with a company called Owen Healthcare right out of college. We managed the Med-Surg supply chain and pharmacy. So, I got that firsthand provider experience at several facilities on the East Coast, in the South, and the Midwest. From there, I went to the manufacturing side and started with a company called DeRoyal. I worked for them in Texas and a couple of other states. Then, I went to the distribution side with Owens & Minor by handling some of their private label lines and eventually working with the distribution side managing national accounts, which included the GPOs, some IDNs, and government.

A few years ago, I decided to bring my passion and experience in healthcare to smaller companies to help bring innovation to the forefront. That led me to work with Excelerant Consulting today. The key to success is listening to the provider. Then you can guide the client with what technology and innovation the provider needs. The goal is to help companies impact the total cost of care or value to the provider at the patient and caregiver level. It's about improving the quality of care. That's what I've been focusing on for the past 24 months.

JP: As we enter into the third year of the pandemic, what are some of the biggest challenges that the healthcare industry faces bringing products and services to market in 2022?

DT: We still have to focus on the logistics of it. We need greater optics on where a product is. We need to broaden the locations of manufacturing and raw materials. There's a lot of turmoil in the world beyond the pandemic that impacts the availability of healthcare products.

We've always seen and have had to manage the pharmaceutical side having shortages of medications. The pandemic exposed the Med-Surg side of healthcare. We can learn from it, and we have to. We can't afford to forget about it. Healthcare is in its climate crisis of change. It was there before the pandemic. Our industry will continue to have these rolling disruptions.

We need to communicate better to build and drive stronger partnerships between IDNs, manufacturers and GPOs. The management of reserve inventories will also play a role.

JP: The vast majority of our readers are national and corporate account executives. What are the most critical issues within IDNs and their distribution and logistics channels today that national account executives should understand?

DT: National account executives are in a unique situation of having broad exposure to almost every aspect of healthcare management. If you're a manufacturer, you have exposure to distributors, GPOs and IDNs. Much of the time, we focus on driving business and guiding the relationships for those organizations. Still, the real value a national accounts executive can bring in today's environment is listening to the IDNs, understanding the process of how distributors are moving products, and utilizing that channel. Also, understand the programs and services in the GPOs and how they will contract in the future. National account executives can then take this information back to their executive teams to build a strategy that integrates all the changes occurring in the market.

Hospitals are looking to improve population health by focusing on the quality of care. They also have inflationary pressures coming in and if you can provide ways for them to be more efficient, then bring that message forward to them. Many of them are running at a 3% profitability, and we're seeing 6-12% inflation in many categories in the market. Take that message to the corporate level of your companies so they can position and bring value and solutions, in order to counteract the inflation. Those who can do this will be the big winners, in my opinion.

Responsible Glove Alliance launches, emphasizes core employment principles

The newly-formed Responsible Glove Alliance (RGA) announced its launch on March 1. All RGA members commit to core principles that recognize the importance of promoting responsible recruitment and employment practices in the medical supplies industry.

Members include:

Ansell Limited
Cardinal Health
Hartalega Holdings Berhad
Henry Schein, Inc.
Kimberly-Clark Corp.
Kossan Rubber Industries Berhad
Medline Industries, LP

The RGA will initially focus its efforts on the Malaysian rubber glove manufacturing industry. The RGA will work to identify, remediate and prevent the conditions giving rise to forced labor through recruitment transformation, collective influence, and the application of due diligence with advanced standards, tools and programs through the application of international standards and due diligence approaches aligned with the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights (UNGP).

Conifer Health Solutions to remain part of Tenet

Tenet Healthcare Corp. announced that – based on ongoing shareholder value creation opportunities and improved business fundamentals – the company will no longer pursue a spinoff of its Conifer Health Solutions subsidiary.

Key factors supporting this decision include:

Significantly improved financial profiles of Tenet and Conifer, including Adjusted EBITDA margin improvement of more than 1,000 basis points at Conifer since 2017.
Expectations that Conifer will deliver FY 2022 revenue growth in the mid- to high-single digits with a strong margin and cash flow profile.
Ongoing benefits anticipated from revamped commercialization efforts, new sales talent and technology, and a focus on point solutions.
New client wins and compelling growth prospects within Conifer’s pipeline.

Atrium Health debuts first new hospital in Charlotte area in over 30 years

Atrium Health Union West opened for the first time on Feb. 23, making it the health system’s first newly built hospital in the Charlotte area in more than 30 years. The hospital will serve the western part of Union County, North Carolina, including the towns of Matthews, Mint Hill, Stallings, Indian Trail, Weddington and surrounding communities in the eastern part of Mecklenburg County.

Atrium Health saw the necessity for this hospital as the area’s population increased over the last decade.

BD names Bill Brown to board

BD announced the appointment of Bill Brown to its board of directors, effective Feb. 28.

Brown is currently the executive chair of L3Harris Technologies, a global aerospace and technology innovator with $18 billion in annual revenue and customers in more than 100 countries. Prior to this role, Brown served as chair and CEO of L3Harris from July 2019 to June 2021, after L3 and Harris merged in 2019. Prior to the merger, Brown served as chair, CEO and president of Harris.

Cleveland Clinic appoints Jacqui Robertson as chief of diversity and inclusion

Cleveland Clinic has appointed Jacqui Robertson as chief of diversity and inclusion, effective March 1. In this role, Robertson will oversee the Office of Diversity and Inclusion, and lead global diversity and inclusion strategies and initiatives across the health system.

This role builds on the organization’s work that focuses on local hiring, inclusive employee resource groups and a commitment to OneTen, a coalition of 37 of the largest U.S. employers to train, hire and promote 1 million Black Americans over the next 10 years.

New poll finds that 23% of healthcare workers likely to leave industry soon

A new poll conducted by USA Today-Ipsos has found that while healthcare workers are still overall satisfied with their jobs, many are still experiencing the ongoing strain perpetuated by the COVID-19 pandemic. Almost 1 in 4 healthcare workers polled are likely to leave the industry altogether soon.

The poll was conducted from Feb. 9-16 among a nationally representative sample of 1,170 healthcare workers including physicians, nurses, paramedics, therapists, and other professionals.

How marketers use audience sharing to increase market share

Your marketing team should always strive to find the best methods for spreading brand awareness and marketing your healthcare products. However, the healthcare field is highly competitive, driving marketers to find unique ways to increase their visibility. One highly effective method that many top marketers use is audience sharing.

Key Takeaways:

Audience sharing occurs when two marketing channels in a business or two separate brands partner to reach the same audience.
You should partner with brands that have the same ideal audience profile but don’t sell similar products to avoid confusing consumers.
American Express, Porsche, and Delta are examples of how a successful partnership can increase your market share.

Increasing your market share

Are you ready to learn how to increase your market share and crush your competition? It all starts with marketing. We’ll take it a step further and say that marketing with the right content is crucial for building a solid foundation – a launchpad for building relationships and winning clients.

At Share Moving Media, our people are passionate about creating and distributing the right content to the right audience at the right time. Our full-service media and content team will create articles, webinars, videos, blog posts, graphics, and other forms of media to help you drum up new business. We also offer live events and educational services to help your team learn and grow in the right direction.

Learn More