Recently, I recorded a podcast episode with our partners, Delta Wellbeing, where we explored how the right digital technology and strategic partnerships can help overcome the significant challenges facing health and social care organizations. These factors help them deliver meaningful results to individual patients and to the health professionals and organizations that support them.

In vast and complex systems like health and social care, no one organization can have all the answers. Strategic partnerships are key to achieving goals far beyond what any one organization could accomplish alone.

While one organization can learn from another, incorporating the expertise of a non-health and social care organization, or one from the private sector, can provide access to that next level of learning.  Such a partnership creates an excellent mechanism for embedding deep, specialist understanding and knowledge around distinct areas like data management, customer relationship management and adoption and business change.  

Building productive partnerships within technology ecosystems

Creating a health and social care system that’s both financially viable and ready to support digital engagement with citizens is important to everyone. However, we need to find new ways to streamline how health and social care organizations navigate complex issues to deliver the digital transformation required to support new models of care, including remote patient management. This innovation is critical to transforming and improving the experiences they deliver to patients and those in need of care.

Strategic partnerships are a strong, effective, and thriving route to generating this transformation. Our work with Delta Wellbeing is a prime example. Covering the West Wales region, we are partnering with them to help develop a digital platform that integrates health and care services to support people in their own homes while they continue to enjoy their daily lives.  

We are integrating a wide range of technologies ranging from improved telecare to delivering virtual wards and remote patient management. Through our platform, data and information from multiple sources deliver a holistic view of the patient and their care, allowing more focus on prevention or early intervention rather than crisis.

In these types of partnerships, the role of a technology integrator is often to understand and design architectures that deliver a complete view of individual service users that overcome information silos and implement a standardized data approach. Clearly, multi-agency collaboration and partnership to establish interoperability at a business process and data integration level is essential, particularly given how many patient and service user touchpoints are within health and social care.

Four transferrable key priorities that can accelerate results

Within strategic partnerships, we’ve identified four key priorities that can accelerate results, and that are transferrable to other sectors and situations:

1. Build an inclusive, single vision

Partnerships work better when people understand that collaboration is the key to reaping the benefits of organizational and technical integration. It’s important to establish where strategic partners with non-medical or care skills can add value. This joint understanding requires a cultural alignment between parties, along with strong leadership to optimize collaboration. Equally important is minimizing duplication of delivery by recognizing when multiple parties are working to resolve a common regional challenge from different directions. Alignment can create a streamlined approach that results in better outcomes that are delivered more quickly.  

2. Be forensic about funding

Often, those who benefit the most from a particular piece of work may not be the ones funding it. Collaboration within strategic partnerships requires transparency and dialog to establish where the funding will flow. A strong sharing mentality across the entire system or region will reinforce buy-in to the end goal, which is enhanced, more effective care approaches that center around the patient or service user experience.

3. Look wider for innovation

Regional organizations, such as innovation centers and universities, are an important source of new ideas, opportunities, and provide a focus on innovation and research. This collaboration must be balanced with the organizations delivering care locally and with community engagement and regional awareness. A blended approach will lead to a formula that will help regional services flourish.  

4. Benefit from networks and capacity

Accessing the pre-existing supplier and organizational network that a new strategic partner brings can enhance your existing ecosystem. When proven delivery partnerships are effectively leveraged in each project or advisory setting, these networks will bring immediate capacity and skills that relieve pressure on current teams. At the same time, they introduce new skill sets for tackling existing problems and future challenges.

Through new procurement initiatives and projects, we are seeing our sector become more open and receptive to new partnerships and consortiums when seeking transformational change.  This is yet another positive step towards creating the right outcomes for our citizens and patients.

Explore how strategic partnerships can work for your organization

Within technology and beyond, strategic partnerships are powerful tools for driving innovation. Contact me to discuss how CGI can support your organization, or to find out more about CGI in Health.