by Red Smith, President, baytechIT
As all health systems know, providing for your organization’s IT needs is critical to not only running your business, but also caring for your patients. But most Managed Service Providers (MSPs) take a one-size-fits-all approach that doesn’t take into account the unique needs of your clinical environment. An IT support and services provider who is focused on healthcare, one who understands and commits to serving the urgency of clinical operations at your facility, is crucial. We asked Red Smith, President of BaytechIT, what you should look for in an MSP to best serve your health delivery organization.
- A User-Centric Model
“Managed Service Providers deliver against either a cost-centric or user-satisfaction-based set of requirements as defined by healthcare IT organizations,” said Smith. “Most managed services engagements gravitate to a model based on the number of users, endpoints and/or infrastructure devices that need to be supported, and most contracts are structured based on that embedded base. But the embedded base doesn’t actually drive costs for healthcare enterprises; costs are driven more by the volume of work required to service the users and endpoints, and the service levels required to fully support patient care. To really be of value to a clinical organization, MSPs should deliver against a user-centric model that is based on the Mean Time to Service Restoration (MTTR). Evaluate your MSP based on the time it takes to resolve an issue for your staff. The faster your MSP solves a problem for your team, the more satisfied your staff will be. And if your end-user is happy, everyone is happy.”
- Incident Rate Reduction Mindset
“MSPs should always be focused on reducing the number of problem tickets submitted over time. There are a million reasons a ticket can be submitted: password reset, no access to Wi-Fi, can’t get into the EMR, etc. The goal is to have fewer tickets than the month before, so your MSP should be tracking incident data and using analytics to identify root causes to implement permanent fixes – not just band-aids,” said Smith. “To most dramatically reduce incident rates, contract with your MSP for comprehensive services across your organization – patching and desktop engineering, for example. Giving your MPS access to the tools that manage the computing and network elements in the embedded base will give them the greatest ability resolve problems. Go beyond just a break/fix agreement.”
- Frequent Caller Reports
“Frequent Caller Reports are an excellent way for your MSP to show they are solving for root cause,” said Smith. “Generally, end users that called more than twice a month fall into one of three categories: 1) The user didn’t get the right fix the first time, or the solution wasn’t adequately explained to the user. 2) The calls were unrelated, with different problems each time. 3) The user may have difficulty with their computer or software, and further training is recommended because the goal (and IT funding) of a helpdesk and field services is more for solving trouble tickets and not for user training. Many clients appreciate seeing Frequent Caller Reports as it helps them understand and address the issues that are driving help desk calls, which then reduces incident rates, and again, improves staff satisfaction. What gets measured gets improved.”
- People-Focused IT Expertise
“It takes a unique skill set to be a solid IT support provider. Empathy, understanding, calm, and the ability to quickly diagnose a technology issue with an upset person on the other end of the line is both an art and science. Your MSP’s frontline team and escalation procedures should leave your staff feeling heard as well as happy. A good MSP brings appropriately skilled resources to the table, measures and reports back to you on speed to answer at call centers, timing of email and self-service ticket responses, and time to first contact resolution – the goal always being to fix it right the first time.”
Smith summarized, “With a health-centric MSP who deeply understands your clinical operations environment, you should expect an increase in customer satisfaction and a decrease in incident rates. BaytechIT offers a superior end user experience to your staff. We understand that your clinicians and support staff are essential, and they need immediate and personalized attention to avoid, or at least minimize, downtime. We know your hospital needs trained engineers on-site even in the middle of a pandemic. We provide peace of mind for our clients because healthcare support is all we do.”
