Guest speakers for the 2019 Supply Chain Summit came from across the country to provide National Account Executives with the knowledge for “getting ahead” in a market that’s constantly changing. A major area in question was how to navigate GPOs and IDNs, and understanding acquisitions and consolidations.
Ken Murawski, President and Founder of Healthcare Links, is a leader in sales and marketing resources focused on Corporate Accounts and matching companies with cost effective products and services to major alliances, IDNs and GPOs. For 16 years, Murawski oversaw Kendall Healthcare’s handling of a variety of products through the acute and alternate care markets, with the last 3 years as their director of National Accounts. Murawski had profit and sales responsibility for over 20 national and regional buying groups and $300 million in group sales.
“We talked about mergers, acquisitions, and consolidation. Think about IDNs as consolidating under one umbrella, and for those that are very integrated, it’s a great opportunity to get more purchasing power under one umbrella,” explains Murawski.
There are some new people in the decision-making realm, he says. Chief medical officers, chief nursing officers, and executives from the C-suite such as CFOs have all been around. “But every 5 years there’s a new acronym,” he says. For instance, chief qualify officers and chief experience officers are new. “Every major system around the country has a chief experience officer – which is about the patient experience, which are all about patient outcome.”
The future of healthcare is about the change in where patient care is being done, he says. Point of care is being migrated to the lowest costs of delivery like clinics, Walmart, CVS, Amazon, virtual care and more. It is projected that by 2025, 60 percent of hospitals will have negative margins, he says. As more data is collected (down to the patient level) every department within the organization will have an unprecedented understanding of real value with supply chains being a part of C-suite and involvement in strategic projects across the organization.
“Everybody asks, ‘Well, should I call on the GPOs or the IDNs … one or the other?’ I think of course it’s a function of your product category. If you don’t have a lot of exposure a GPO contract (if you can get it) is an excellent way to build awareness within the memberships, because they can help you market it. For example, they can email blast testimonials, newsletters etc.”
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