Five Components of a Thought Leadership Strategy

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The role of a thought leader is to offer unique insight on a specific topic, problem, or trend and establish themselves as a go-to resource. A successful thought leadership strategy supports organizational business goals, making it an essential part of any communication plan. You shouldn’t have to look hard to find a thought leader in your organization—they typically are the individuals in your C-suite, but there are likely others equally as valuable in your organization with ideas, passion, and experience that may be credible thought leaders.

Thought leadership can take many forms, such as contributed content, speaking engagements, webinars, white papers, and an ongoing social media presence. It is imperative to remember that, like all communication efforts, strategy should drive thought leadership and consistency is critical. Having a clear strategy tied to your business goals will help establish your voice, get buy-in from leadership, and allow for effective measurement of your program.

The best way to start is by identifying topics your thought leaders can speak to that will support your organization’s goals. For example, if you are a health IT vendor that wants to increase sales of your population health tools, focus on promoting your organization’s point of view (POV) on effective population health management.

Below are five components to consider incorporating in your thought leadership strategy.

1. Proactive outreach

Recently, members of ReviveHealth’s public relations team attended July’s Nashville Public Relations Society of America luncheon featuring presenter Johnny Smith Jr., senior director of public relations at Ascension. A fellow attendee asked about why proactive public relations is important to thought leadership. His response?

“PR is a tackle sport.”

The first step of proactive PR is engaging in daily media monitoring and other environmental scanning techniques to determine what topics are trending in your industry. Then, join the conversation via social media, contributed articles, etc., sharing your organization’s point of view. But remember: be strategic and specific about the topics your expert can speak to and make sure they are relevant to your business and the industry. See also: Managing the Race Against a Bad Reputation

Another tip from Smith, Jr.: it’s imperative to establish and maintain relationships with media, which lowers the barrier to entry when joining the conversation. A key part of this is setting up face-to-face meetings between thought leaders and reporters whenever possible—these often prove more valuable than a phone call or email. These conversations are opportunities to share a POV and establish credibility as source for reporters.

2. Local involvement

Securing coverage in trade and national consumer publications might be the goal, but having a presence in local media is foundational to any thought leadership strategy. This way, when you approach trade and national publications with your company’s story, you’ll already have an established presence as a thought leader on the subject on the local level. This could mean contributing content, writing a monthly column or being mentioned in an industry story.

Local media is also a chance for you to get creative as a PR professional. Is there a cause your thought leaders are passionate about they can advocate for locally? If you have a thought leader that’s making waves in the industry, what local award nominations are a good fit? These activities in the community will help lead to organic media coverage locally and beyond.

3. Speaking engagements

Securing speaking engagements are a tried-and-true practice when it comes to elevating the thought leaders in your organization. These opportunities get you in front of your audience and allow you to engage with them directly. Research opportunities for your thought leaders to give keynote speeches and participate in panel discussions or Q&As at industry conferences as part of your proactive PR activities.

Pro tip: the best way for vendors to showcase your business’ innovative solutions is to partner with one of your clients and share their success story. It’s a win-win for both parties. Check out this blog to learn more about The Power of the Proposal.

4. Content creation

In addition to earned media coverage, take advantage of blogging, op-eds, contributed content, webinars, and white papers. Developing a variety of content allows you to continually engage with your audience at different stages of the buyer’s journey while generating interest about a topic.

Make sure your content links to other (relevant) previously-developed thought leadership materials – such as white papers you’ve created and recordings of webinars – on your website.

5. Social media

Social media is another avenue for creating content and sharing your POV. Speaking at an event? Tell your organization’s followers and live tweet the presentation. Hosting a webinar? Invite your target audience to attend by setting up a Facebook event. Just released a new white paper discussing the current industry trends? Have the paper’s author publish a short blog about the content on his or her personal LinkedIn page.

Social media is also the place to share relevant industry articles and news that, while may not quote your thought leader specifically, still supports your thought leadership strategy. Remember, use the 80/20 rule on social media. Roughly 80 percent of the content you post should be non-branded industry content, while 20 percent should promote your organization.

A thought leadership strategy is critical to elevating your organization in the public sphere, and therefore helping achieve business goals. To maximize success, be strategic and consistent through proactive activities with your audience such as speaking engagements, content sharing, online communication and local advocacy.

 

 

More Aggressive Review of Hospital Mergers Needed, Says FTC Commissioner

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The problems include ‘a legal shield’ enjoyed by nonprofit hospitals, and the solutions include more retrospective analysis of close calls, says Rebecca Kelly Slaughter.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

The FTC is prohibited from enforcing antitrust laws against nonprofits, which poses a challenge, Slaughter said.

The commission should conduct another round of retrospective study on closed healthcare mergers, she said.

Commissioners should be ‘as aggressive as possible’ moving forward to preserve healthcare competition, she added.

Federal Trade Commissioner Rebecca Kelly Slaughter told a liberal think tank Tuesday that antitrust regulators should take a more assertive approach to protect competitive forces among healthcare providers.

Slaughter, a Democrat appointed to the FTC by President Trump and confirmed last year, made the remarks in a speech at the Center for American Progress in Washington, D.C., where she took issue with what she described as “a legal shield for anticompetitive conduct” at nonprofit hospitals.

The FTC is allowed to review all hospital mergers, but it cannot enforce antitrust laws against nonprofits, including more than 45% of U.S. hospitals, she said.

“So, for example, if a non-profit hospital merger itself is not anticompetitive, but the newly merged entity engages in anticompetitive practices, the FTC is stuck on the sidelines,” Slaughter said in her prepared remarks.

“In effect, this means that all of the healthcare industry expertise that the FTC has worked for decades to, and continues to, develop cannot be deployed alongside the DOJ and state enforcers to stop anticompetitive practices by roughly half of all hospitals nationwide,” she added. “This is a significant lost opportunity.”

Slaughter called for greater scrutiny of horizontal and vertical mergers alike both in the future and in the past.

“I believe that the FTC should conduct a new round of retrospectives of healthcare provider mergers,” Slaughter said.

Studying the past has led the FTC to some of its biggest improvements in understanding market forces, as was the case with former Chairman Timothy J. Muris’ retrospective analysis of hospital mergers in the early 2000s, Slaughter said.

Moving forward, Slaughter said, the FTC should take another look at recently cleared “close-call hospital mergers” and those that were shielded from antitrust scrutiny by state laws despite posing significant concerns. This is consistent, she said, with a statement the FTC issued last fall when it decided not to challenge a proposed affiliation involving CareGroup Inc., Lahey Health System Inc., Seacoast Regional Health System, and others.

The FTC should also consider taking another look at vertical integration among healthcare providers, such as transactions involving hospitals and physician groups, she said.

“[W]e should be as aggressive as possible in challenging the mergers we encounter today, especially where the proposed consolidation involves new structural arrangements rather than traditional horizontal concerns,” Slaughter added. “It is important for parties considering mergers to know we will not shy away from challenging, for example, anticompetitive vertical organizations.”

“I am sensitive to the concern that we might lose litigation,” she added, “but our obligation is to identify the right outcome and fight for it.”

 

 

 

House Subcommittee Takes Dim View of Healthcare Consolidation

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Lawmakers and witnesses alike cited the ill-effects of hospital mergers and acquisitions in a long list of industry behavior they find troubling.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

An economics and health policy professor from Carnegie Mellon suggested lawmakers should give the FTC more power to review nonprofit mergers.

Lawmakers from both sides of the aisle expressed dissatisfaction with the healthcare industry’s consolidation trend and voiced support for legislative action.

A hearing of the House Judiciary Committee’s antitrust subcommittee would not have been a comfortable place Thursday for any healthcare executive touting the benefits of a planned merger or acquisition.

Lawmakers and witnesses took turns criticizing rampant consolidation among hospitals and other healthcare companies. While the public is often told these deals will lead to improved efficiency and higher quality care, those purported benefits frequently fail to materialize, they said.

Since the hearing grouped payer and provider consolidation with anticompetitive concerns about the pharmaceutical industry—an area that both major parties have expressed interest in addressing through congressional action—the discussion could signal how lawmakers will approach any legislation to address the problems they perceive.

Rep. Doug Collins, a Republican from Georgia and the committee’s ranking member, said hospital consolidation has had an especially detrimental impact on rural communities in his state.

“These communities often already have few options for quality care, so as hospital consolidation has increased over the past 10 years, rural communities like my own have been hurt the most,” Collins said.

“At times, these mergers and acquisitions can help rural communities by keeping facilities open, but often they result in full or partial closures and shifting patients from nearby facilities to those hours away,” he added.

Some problems caused by consolidation, such as increased travel times for emergency services, can “literally mean the difference in life and death,” Collins said.

Jerry Nadler, a Democrat from New York and the committee’s chairman, said there’s no question that the recent spate of mergers has contributed to the industry’s problems.

“It is well documented that hospital mergers can lead to higher prices and lower quality of care,” Nadler said.

Martin Gaynor, PhD, an economics and health policy professor at Carnegie Mellon University and a founder of the Health Care Cost Institute, said in his testimony that there have been nearly 1,600 hospital mergers in the past 20 years, leading most regions to be dominated by one large health system apiece.

“This massive consolidation in healthcare has not delivered for Americans. It has not given us better care or enhanced efficiency,” Gaynor said. “On the contrary, extensive research evidence shows us that consolidation between close competitors results in higher prices, and patient quality of care suffers for lack of competition.”

Since hospitals that have fewer competitors can better negotiate favorable payment terms, this consolidated landscape “poses a serious challenge for payment reform,” he added.

“Our healthcare system is based on markets. That system is only going to work as well as the markets that underpin it,” Gaynor said. “Unfortunately, these markets do not function as well as they could or should.”

Gaynor recommended several possible policy changes, including an end to policies that make it harder for new competitors to enter a market and compete and an expanded authority for the Federal Trade Commission to review potentially anticompetitive conduct by nonprofit entities. He also said lawmakers should consider imposing FTC reporting requirements for even small transactions to enhance the tracking capabilities of enforcement agencies.

To support his claims, in his written testimony, Gaynor pointed to research he completed with Farzad Mostashari of Aledade Inc. and Paul B. Ginsburg of The Brookings Institution.

 

 

 

 

Grassley Renews Probe of Nonprofit Hospitals

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The Iowa Republican has asked the IRS for data on how many of the nation’s approximately 3,000 tax-exempt hospitals are in compliance with charity care requirements.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

Grassley asked for information about whether tax-exempt hospitals are meeting the statutory requirements laid out in section 501 of the Internal Revenue Code.

The lawmaker is renewing his probe of tax-exempt hospitals after hearing reports that ‘at least some of these tax-exempt hospitals have cut charity care, despite increased revenue.’

Senate Finance Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley has renewed efforts to ensure that nonprofit hospitals are earning their tax-exempt status by providing enough services for low-income people.

In a letter to Internal Revenue Service Commissioner Charles Rettig, the Iowa Republican asked for data on how many hospitals are in compliance with the requirements for tax-exempt status and the status of IRS examinations of those not in compliance.

“Making sure that tax-exempt hospitals abide by their community benefit standards is a very important issue for me,” Grassley said in his letter.

“As chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, I oversaw an investigation into the billing practices of the Mosaic Life Care hospital. That investigation resulted in debt relief of almost $17 million for thousands of low-income patients.  This issue is still just as important to me now that I am chairman of the Senate Finance Committee,” Grassley wrote.

The Mosaic Life inquiry examined the billing and debt collection practices at the health system after news reports indicated it had sued low-income patients who should have qualified for charity care.

Grassley told Rettig that he was renewing his probe of tax-exempt hospitals after hearing “reports” that “at least some of these tax-exempt hospitals have cut charity care, despite increased revenue, calling into question their compliance with the standards set by Congress.”

He asked Rettig for information about whether tax-exempt hospitals are meeting the statutory requirements laid out in section 501 of the Internal Revenue Code, and he cited in his letter an article in Politico that suggested nonprofit hospitals were profiting from the Affordable Care Act while simultaneously cutting their charity care.

In February 2018, Grassley sent a letter to the IRS to inquire about how the agency reviews nonprofit hospital compliance.

Acting Commissioner David J. Kautter responded in April 2018 that the IRS reviews the status of about 1,000 U.S. tax-exempt hospitals each year by reviewing Forms 990, hospital websites, and other information in order to identify the hospitals with the highest likelihood of noncompliance.

Kautter said the IRS assigns either a compliance check or examination to those hospitals that appear to be most at risk of noncompliance.

Melinda Hatton, general counsel for the American Hospital Association, said her organization was confident that nonprofit hospitals are meeting their mission.

“In 2015, an AHA analysis of Schedule H filings reported that 13.3% of tax-exempt hospitals and health systems total expenses were devoted to community benefits programs, and that half of that spending was attributable to expenditures for providing financial assistance to needy patients and absorbing losses from Medicaid and other means-tested government program underpayments,” she said.

Hatton said an analysis by Ernst & Young for the AHA found that hospitals’ and health systems’ community benefit activities outweigh the value of their federal tax exemption by a factor of 11 to one. “According to the report, non-profit hospitals in 2013 were exempt from an estimated $6 billion in federal taxes and provided an estimated $67.4 billion in community benefits,” Hatton said.

“Making sure that tax-exempt hospitals abide by their community benefit standards is a very important issue for me.”

 

 

 

AHA Pushes Back on Politico’s Description of Nonprofit Hospital Financials

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Image result for cherry picked

he American Hospital Association’s general counsel said Politico “cherry-picked” metrics from a recent Moody’s report.

In a blog post Wednesday, American Hospital Association (AHA) General Counsel Melinda Hatton rebuked Politico’s characterization of a recent Moody’s report on nonprofit hospital financials in 2018.

Hatton charged that Politico “cherry-picked” metrics from the report, homed in on a “single measure of financial viability,” and “ignored much of the medians data that tell a more complete story.”

Writing that the story “does not accurately capture financial pressures facing hospitals,” Hatton continued that the Moody’s report only represents a mid-year glimpse at nonprofit hospital finances. 

The public back and forth began with the May 13 edition of Politico’s Pulse newsletter, which described the state of U.S. hospitals as “OK,” citing data from Moody’s that indicated nonprofit hospital revenues grew faster than costs for the first time since 2015.

While mentioning that the average operating margin of nonprofit hospitals was 1.7% last year, Politico also noted that average operating cash flow margins finished at 8%.

Politico stated that industry observers regard operating cash flow margin as a better reflection of “how much money a hospital is actually collecting” than the operating margin.

Politico’s description tied into the push for greater accountability from hospitals regarding high prices, specifically referencing a recent RAND Corp. study that found private insurers paid more than twice what Medicare paid to hospitals in 2017.

Hospital groups like the AHA and the Federal of American Hospitals pushed back on the RAND study from last week, taking issue with its sample size and reliance on Medicare payment rates as the benchmark for hospital prices.

Writing about the Moody’s report, Hatton wrote that while hospitals did experience a “modest uptick” in revenue growth last year, such growth trailed historical levels as hospitals faced challenging patient volumes, low reimbursement rates, and shifting payer mixes.

She also noted that the Moody’s report found that inpatient services remained flat in 2018, widespread provider consolidation has offered “stability in light of downward financial pressures,” and that hospitals are continuing to put “efficiency improvements” into place.

“Many of the expenses hospitals’ are experiencing now, and will likely experience in the future, are beyond their control,” Hatton wrote. “Wages and benefits are the single largest cost for hospitals, and are likely to increase in the future as the nation experiences a robust labor market, and a nursing shortage persists in many communities. The high cost of specialty drugs is also a driver of the cost of care.”

“These complexities make for a nuanced story, but any story worth telling is worth telling well,” Hatton wrote.

 

 

 

 

 

Nonprofit Hospital Consolidation to Continue in 2019

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Despite increased scrutiny from regulators, nonprofit health systems will remain active through mergers and acquisitions this year, according to a new Moody’s report.

The deluge of M&A activity among nonprofit health systems is expected to continue on in 2019, with the potential for some “unconventional relationships,” according to a Moody’s report released Friday morning.

Driven by tight financial conditions challenging the nonprofit hospital business model, as well as the entrance of nontraditional corporate players to healthcare and the potential changes to the ACA, more M&A activity is expected throughout the year.

Moody’s expects nonprofit health systems to engage in partnerships with other hospitals but also seek to align with companies specializing in data analytics or ridesharing services to continue the transition from inpatient care to outpatient care.

Nonprofit health systems are also aiming to increase their footing when negotiating with payers, which involves strategic decisions to diversity service options and increase their geographic reach.

The report cites ProMedica’s acquisition of HCR Manorcare and Tower Health’s purchase of five for-profit acute care hospitals as examples of nonprofit systems taking a short-term credit hit to gain stable long-term positioning for the organization.

Though M&A activity is expected to be widespread and a primary objective for many nonprofit systems, the Moody’s report warned that additional scrutiny from state and federal regulators is on the way.

The requirements put in place on the CHI-Dignity Health merger by California Attorney General Xavier Becerra, along with price increase restrictions imposed by Massachusetts Attorney General Maura Healey on CareGroup and Lahey Health, are cited as examples of the terms health systems should expect to meet.

For-profits will tap into capital markets

The Moody’s report also indicates that for-profit hospitals will delve further into capital markets so long as they remain receptive and buoyed by low interest rates. This approach could lead to lower interest costs and improve liquidity, which would bolster their credit standing.

Jessica Gladstone, Moody’s associate managing director and lead analyst on for-profit hospitals, told HealthLeaders that rising interest rates would a material impact on many for-profit hospitals.

“High cash interest costs relative to earnings are already consuming the majority of cash for many FP hospital companies,” Gladstone said. “For companies with floating rate debt, rising interest rates (depending on the amount of the increase) could leave some FP hospitals with very little free cash flow left to pay down debt or otherwise invest to grow operations.”

Gladstone added that while many of the same headwinds facing for-profit hospitals remain a challenge in 2019, executives can be encouraged by the opportunities ahead to refinance high-cost debt and achieve cost savings.

Several deals are listed as potential opportunities that could benefit for-profit healthcare organizations in 2019 regarding changes to capital structure, interest cost savings, as well as M&A activity:

Additional highlights from the Moody’s report:

  • Expect smaller community and regional nonprofit hospitals to join cooperatives to gain leverage at the negotiating table on supply costs among other price points.
  • Growing investment by private equity firms in physician practices and ambulatory services, will put a pinch on nonprofit systems.
  • The entrance of Amazon, Walmart, and Apple can’t be discounted as another driver of M&A activity in 2019.
  • Vertical mergers like CVS-Aetna and the continued rise of telemedicine will drive patients away from traditional areas of care delivery, like hospitals.
  • Though major changes to the ACA remain unlikely due to the split government in Congress, smaller changes could still make a significant impact.
  • The report cites potential changes to site-neutral payments, Medicare quality-factor penalties, and DSH payment reductions as examples.