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Session Descriptions

Diversified Resource Development Strategies for Health Networks (Pre-Conference Workshop)

Amy Forsyth-Stephens, Forsyth-Stephens Consulting, LLC

This 3-hour pre-conference workshop on Sunday, April 17, 2011 from 3:00 PM – 6:00 PM will cover topics of interest to network leaders who have responsibility for ensuring the sustainability of their networks during these uncertain economic times. Topics will include:

Crafting your Value Statement

Diversifying your Revenue Streams

Prospecting vs. Fishing

Creating a Development Plan

Creating an annual Development Calendar

Income Generation

Learning Objectives:

Upon completion of the pre-conference workshop, attendees will be able to:

1. Craft a value statement for their Network, modifiable for a variety of funder types.
2. Identify the various categories of revenue that could potentially support Network activities.
3. Identify the steps involved in prospecting for funding from private and corporate sources.
4. Create a comprehensive Network Development Plan for the coming three years.
5. Create an annual Development Calendar for use in the coming twelve months.
6. Identify those Network income generation strategies that have been deemed successful.

NOTE:Registration is limited to the first 25 to select this pre-conference workshop, so please register early if you plan to attend this workshop.

Rural Health Works: A Model for Health Networks (Pre-Conference Workshop)

Dr. Gerard Doeksen, The Center for Rural Health Works

The National Center for Rural Health Works will present a "Train the Trainer" workshop on Sunday, April 17, 2011, from 1 pm -5 pm. The workshop will be designed to assist networks in preparing the economic impact of the network. This will include all members of the network and will show the local residents how important the network is to their health, as well as to the community’s economy. A sample study will be prepared for a network prior to the workshop. This study will be used for illustrating the importance of the network to the local economy. Network leaders and other professionals involved with health networks are the target audience for this session. Enrollment will be limited to 20 to 25 participants and will be “First Come, First Serve.”

The National Rural Health Perspective

Alan Morgan, CEO, NRHA

Rural America is a unique health care delivery environment that requires innovative approaches to delivering health care. This session will look and current and future trends in rural health policy. Attendees will hear about recent Federal legislative and regulatory efforts to improve access to care, and what steps they can take to make a difference for their rural communities. In specific, this session will examine how changing demographics, emerging technologies, health care coverage trends and federal regulations may impact health networks in the coming years.

Concurrent Session: You’ll never break a horse if you stay sitting on the fence – Sustainability through calculated risk

Toniann Richard, Executive Director, Health Care Coalition of Lafayette County
Beverly Santicola, CEO, 2010 Purpose Prize Fellow, US Government Grants

The HCC network will present information regarding sustainability through partnerships, community development and programs.

Learning objectives will include:

1. How providers can help sustain your network
2. Using health insurance reform to help sustain your network
3. Making technology work for your network

Come join an interactive discussion about leveraging your community and network partners to work toward your sustainability.

Assisting your members without getting “Bucked Off”!

Chris Hopkins, MBA, Vice President Strategy and Business Development
Dave Johnson, Director of Member Relations & Business Development for RWHC

Combined, the Rural Wisconsin Health Cooperative (RWHC) and Montana Health Network (MHN) have over 50 years of experience in the healthcare network arena. They have built this on a platform of shared services. Most if not all of the shared services offered by RWHC and MHN have grown from member need. Dave Johnson from RWHC and Chris Hopkins from MHN will present current information on developing sustainable product lines as well as an in depth review of MHN’s education program, where these principles have been applied. Participants will leave the presentation with the following concepts:

An example of sustainable, regenerating service lines

How to harvest opportunities from your membership

How to avoid “non starters”

Non negotiables for starting a new service

Identifying partnership opportunities

A model for a successful new start

Key concepts that make a program sustainable

Strategies for Riding Through Change

Sharon Felts, Leadership Strategies

This is an educational session to introduce participants to a model for navigating personal or organizational change.

Participants will:

Learn about the Change Cycle Model

Discover initial tools for dealing with the six sequential stages portrayed in the Change Cycle

Hear examples of successful personal and organizational change and how you might use the same strategies in your organization

A New Player in the Rural Health Network: Home Care Cooperative

Elizabeth Bailey, Executive Director, Cooperative Development Foundation
Leonila Vega, Esq., Executive Director, Direct Care Alliance

The U.S. Census Bureau reports that, between 2006 and 2016, direct care work will be one of the fastest-growing occupations in the nation, with the demand for personal and home care aides expected to grow by approximately 50 percent. Aging baby boomers, along with adults that are living longer, account for much of the increased demand for services; however, the new health care reform law reinforces that demand with its stated preference for home- and community-based services. The challenge is to make direct care jobs an attractive alternative and to build stability and quality care into the direct care workforce. Much of that can be achieved through effective recruitment and training, but consideration should also be given to a more innovative model for the direct care business itself: a worker-owned home care cooperative. We are convinced that a rural health care delivery system that includes viable home care cooperatives has the potential to bring about long term care cost savings, enable thousands of senior citizens to enjoy independent living with quality care/services, create a stabile and trained workforce, and empower working men and women to earn a living wage as member/owners of home care cooperatives.

In this session we would like to establish the following learning objectives:

1. Provide an overview of the challenges faced by health providers to meet the health care needs of the projected additional 27 million older Americans that will need essential health care services in the next decade

2. Discuss the role of the direct care workforce in the future of health care delivery, health promotion and prevention

3. Provide a brief overview of the cooperative business model and, specifically, discuss the home care cooperative model and what makes it different from other forms of home care business enterprises

4. Discuss the role of home care cooperatives as one of the solutions to the challenges of delivering health care to older Americans

Collaborative Leadership: Building Trust

Holly Crump, Network Director, Arizona Rural Women's Health Network

Collaborative leadership embraces the concept that leadership traditionally is positional, individually driven, top down, directive and transactional. Leadership in networks is relational, facilitative, collective, bottom-up and emergent. This work is based on the Turning Point Initiative and funded by Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. This interactive session will identify the six characteristics of collaborative leadership and focus on a core concept of collaboration: building trust in sustainable health networks.

The participants in this session will:

Explore the definition of Collaborative Leadership and its six common characteristics

Identify skills for building trust

Self Assess for trust behaviors essential for collaborative leaders

Participants will work individually and in small and large group activities to discover collaborative leadership and the characteristics necessary to this leadership process. Together, they will investigate this source of innovation and creative solutions available to networks and their leaders when there is diversity, connection and cohesion in their groups. Once there is a working vocabulary and understanding of the basic tenets of this leadership concept, a case study will be assigned to small groups in which they will discuss the evidence of collaborative practice and the outcomes that result from successful application of collaborative leadership.

Next, participants will use a self-assessment tool to highlight their collaborative behaviors that build trust in their networks. Small group work will be reported out to the larger community for successes already evident and three actions each will take to further the collaboration process in their networks. Handouts and resources will be made available at the session and online.

Arizona Border Communities Health Network: Methodologies for Strategic Planning and Network Building for Collaboration

Hannah Hafter, MPH Coordinator, Arizona Border Communities Health Network

The Arizona Border Communities Health Network (Red Sin Paredes) is a new, regional network currently completing the planning stages with the mission to connect community partners to strengthen Arizona-Sonora [Mexico] border collaboration and coordination for improved health and health services. The Network builds on a collaborative history of binational health councils in three border communities (Ambos Nogales, Douglas/Agua Prieta, and Yuma San Luis).

The Southeast Arizona Area Health Education Center, Inc., SEAHEC, partnered with key health agencies along the Arizona-Sonora (Mexico) border, forming this network to jointly address the unique health challenges of border communities including their growing population, poverty levels, obesity, diabetes and tuberculosis; as well as the recent global emergence of the H1N1 influenza virus, HIV/STI transmission, drug trafficking, violence and other problems. During its initial year, the Network created a virtual resource library, which is a web-based library housing existing health needs assessments at community and county levels.

One of the networks objectives has been strengthening local capacity and making commitments to collaborate in addressing identified local priorities. To do this, an innovative Capacity Building Assessment was conducted border-wide and with each binational health council. This capacity building assessment methodology is known as I-STAR and our presentation will focus on the utilization of I STAR as a strategic planning tool. The I-STAR process produces a plan for network development and change to direct future work.

Learning Objectives:

Participants will understand the purpose of the I-STAR planning tool and how to connect with I-STAR facilitators if they would like to conduct a similar capacity building process.

Participants will obtain ideas and examples about how to adapt a general strategic planning process (such as, but not limited to, I-STAR) to their particular local needs and goals.

Participants will gain a greater understanding border/binational-specific health issues, the role of networks in addressing them, and some of the key challenges to border/binational collaboration and what can be done about them.

Roadmap for Creating a Successful HIT Network

Terry Hill, Executive Director, National Rural Health Resource Center
Sally Trnka, Program Coordinator II, National Rural Health Resource Center

Health information technology (HIT) is consuming the workplans and budgets of healthcare organizations across the country. Networks are in a strategic position to help their members meet the new “Meaningful Use” requirements. Join us as we: (1) describe a comprehensive HIT network readiness assessment; (2) lay out a road map for HIT network development; and, (3) profile several successful HIT network models.

Learning Objective 1: After this presentation, attendees will understand the HIT Readiness Assessment Tool created by the National Rural Health Resource Center, and how they can use it within their networks.

Learning Objective 2: After this presentation, attendees will gain awareness of strategies used by successful HIT networks in the development their networks.

Learning Objective 3: After this presentation, attendees will have a broader understanding of how to plan a roadmap to meet the HIT needs of their members.

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