IT Governance
Successful healthcare organizations recognize the value of IT as a strategic asset.
Historically IT has played primarily a supporting role for billing, records management, logistics, and general administration. Only with the emergence of electronic medical records (EMRs and EHRs) has IT transitioned into an essential component of the delivery of care. As the number of deployed EMR systems increases, Health IT has become almost a panacea solution to ensure patient safety, improve outcomes, and achieve cost efficiencies. Indeed, healthcare IT has becomes strategic not just for an individual organization but for society at large.
This transformation is quite remarkable for a function that has largely been tolerated as a cost center and where wholesale IT sourcing is a common management approach to keep that cost under control. However, as IT takes its place as a strategic asset, a different approach to management structures and controls is necessary to ensure IT value delivery. In particular:
- IT strategy must be appropriately aligned with the organization’s business strategy;
- Potential IT investments must be evaluated in terms of their anticipated strategic benefits;
- The strategic goals must be translated to performance objectives of individual systems. These performance objectives themselves must be translated to acceptance criteria for systems in development;
- Operational Systems must be measured and monitored to ensure the achievement of anticipated strategic benefits.
Tunitas Group Services
Tunitas Group consultants provide expertise and assistance in each of the four IT Governance task areas. Our tools to accomplish the above objectives include the following Tunitas Group products:
- A Balanced Scorecard for EMR. Developed by Kaplan and Norton in the 1993 balanced scorecards, along with strategy maps, are the consummate tool for expressing and managing corporate strategy. Tunitas Group has cataloged the various strategic objectives associated with EMRs and translated those into strategic IT objectives. From these, Tunitas Group has developed a proforma set of performance objectives and outcome measures. Contact us for a fact sheet and license information.
- Mapping of COBIT to JCAHO Accreditation Criteria. COBIT (Control Objectives for Information and related Technology) provides a framework for the management and control of IT related activities with an emphasis on quality improvement. The Joint Commission accreditation criteria are the standards by which healthcare organizations manage care delivery. The Tunitas Group mapping rationalizes IT expenditures in terms of their potential impact on care delivery and accreditation. Contact us for a fact sheet and license information.
Tunitas Group Expertise
Tunitas Group consultants are certified governance professionals. In addition to the ISACA CGEIT we are certified in COBIT, VALIT and the ITIL Foundation series.