On September 15, 2020, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services issued guidance to support state Medicaid Directors in moving towards value-based arrangements and alternative payment models. The guidance outlines lessons learned from early state and federal experiences in implementing […]

Executive teams of behavioral health organizations are balancing several issues at the same time – improving access to care, productivity management, ensuring consumer safety, reducing administrative costs, and more. The solutions to these issues are increasingly being addressed by artificial […]

By Monica Oss, Chief Executive Officer, OPEN MINDS   It appears we’re moving right from the pandemic emergency to the stagflation emergency. Like every executive, I’ve been waiting for the pandemic emergency to ‘be over’ and return to normal—or at […]

By Monica Oss, Chief Executive Officer, OPEN MINDS   This year has seen increasing financial pressure on health and human service provider organizations. This week, the Kaufman Hall’s monthly report on health system finances reported that U.S. hospitals and health […]

By Monica Oss, Chief Executive Officer, OPEN MINDS   For most specialty and primary care provider organizations, contracts with health plans are a strategic necessity. Health plan enrollment has grown across the commercial, Medicare, and Medicaid sectors. They control the […]

By Joe Naughton-Travers, Ed.M., Senior Associate & Executive Editor, Management Newsletter, OPEN MINDS   This year, OPEN MINDS has been focused on crafting a winning strategy, including a deep dive into the four phases of strategic planning (see Crafting Organizational Strategy: A Best-Practice Path […]

By Joe Naughton-Travers, Ed.M., Senior Associate & Executive Editor, Management Newsletter, OPEN MINDS   Discussions about organizational strategy can easily take a negative turn, especially when talking about whether boards of directors at specialty provider organizations are up for the […]

Everything about strategic planning starts with a vision of where the organization is going and the measurable objectives that need to be achieved along the way. Vision statements are built on the organization’s mission, which is the statement of why […]

Realizing “market advantage” means strategically planning for market advantage—a process that “everyone does,” but few executives perfect. When done well, strategic plans can either assure sustainability and drive performance, or they can make sure the organization can adapt quickly enough […]

Over the course of the past three years, the expansion of the health plan footprint in the field has increased. Health plans manage 95% of commercial/employer members, 90% of Medicaid members, and 50% of Medicare members (see Managed Care Plans Cover […]

Slowly but surely, value-based reimbursement (VBR) is happening in the specialty provider marketplace. 40% of specialty provider organizations reported participating in a VBR contract (an increase of 13% from the previous year) according to our 2022 OPEN MINDS Performance Management […]