This interactive pre-conference workshop at the 2013 NCHN Conference will take participants through the what, why, how and when of program evaluation outcomes with an emphasis on evidence-based outcomes in the first half. During the second half of the workshop, participants will work on examples from their own health network of creating and incorporating appropriate outcomes. 

At the conclusion of this workshop, participants will be able to define evaluation outcomes, evidence-based outcomes and difference between the two; know the process of creating and incorporating appropriate outcomes into their programs and organization; and, understand the value of measurement to improving and growing their health network.

Both Martin and Melzer are nationally recognized evaluators with many years of experience in program evaluation and research and are currently working in health care and health network areas.  The workshop will be highly interactive, use examples from health networks and provide ample time for questions and discussion.

Participants will learn:

• What program evaluation outcomes are and how to create appropriate ones.
• What evidence-based outcomes are and how they are differentiated from traditional outcomes.
• Why evidence-based outcomes are important and why outcomes in general are critical to sustaining and growing a health network.
• How to create and incorporate appropriate outcomes for one of their programs (the process).
• When to begin thinking about program evaluation outcomes.

Participants will be presented with:

• Information from HRSA about the move toward evidence-based outcomes in their grant-making.
• Information and examples of technological tools – dashboards – that can bring multiple programs’ outcomes together strategically. 

Melzer and Martin have collaborated on numerous projects over the past eight years. They bring energy, insight and common sense to the often-misunderstood elements of program evaluation and research, adding value in all stages.

Pre-Conference Workshop Registration Fee: $50 for NCHN members; $75 for non-members

» about Gwen Martin, Ph.D.
» about Becky Melzer, M.A.
» about Leticia Manning
» about Toniann Richard

 

In the long history of organizations—beginning when we first formed small tribes to survive—the network is the newest, the most powerful, and, at the same time, the oldest form of organization. How can the network motivate people—and organizations—to take risks and do what they cannot do alone? How can networks become powerful magnets to attract others and spur participation? How can members of networks compete and cooperate at the same time? How can everyone—and every organization—in the network become a leader? And how can we think differently about evaluating and measuring networks?
In this talk, combined with question and answer, we’ll put our heads together to address these issues and leave the morning session with a new understanding of the power of networks.

Jessica Lipnack is CEO and co-founder of NetAge, a Boston-based consultancy. For three decades, Jessica and Jeff Stamps (1944-2011), the company’s founders, have provided expertise and tools that allow their clients to collaborate more effectively in virtual teams, cross-boundary organizations, and networks. NetAge's pioneering initiatives are in use in global companies, public sector organizations, non-profits, governments, and religious denominations.

Jessica’s research and practical experience have taken her around the world. Among the clients for whom she has delivered training, seminars, and consulting: Alberta Health Services, American Management Association, Assurant, Apple, AT&T Universal Card Services, BankBoston, The Brookings Institution, Cisco, Credit Suisse, Digital Equipment Corporation, Dudley Street Neighborhood Initiative, General Electric, Fidelity Investments, Fiserv, Hewlett-Packard, Hyatt Hotels, IBM, Intel, Kerr-McGee, Marriott, National Association of Corporate Directors, National Education Association, NCR, Omgeo, PeopleSoft, Pfizer, Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), Qantas, Roche, Royal Dutch Shell, Steelcase, Tetra Pak, The United Nations, The White House, U.S. Army, U.S. Joint Forces, Visiting Nurse Service of New York, Volvo, and the Wisconsin Technology Initiative.

With Jeff, Jessica literally wrote the book on Networking (Doubleday) and on Virtual Teams (Wiley)—along with four other books, including The TeamNet Factor and The Age of the Network—that have been translated into many languages. Noted writing includes “Why BP Crashed and Killed the Gulf” (Harvard Business Review Blogs); “The Virtual, Networked Organization” (in The Handbook of High Performance Virtual Teams, Jossey-Bass); “The Strange Beauty of Virtual Teams;” “The Easier Way to Work: Collaborating in World- Class Virtual Teams;” and “Communicate, Collaborate, Coordinate, Decide: How IT Achieves Strategic Leadership.”

The landmark article, “Can Absence Make a Team Grow Stronger?”, Harvard Business Review, which Jessica and Jeff wrote with two business school professors, reported on best practices in “far-flung” teams and is included in HBR’s 10 Must Reads on Teams. Jessica and Jeff also served as mentors for the Harvard Business Press Pocket Mentor Leading Virtual Teams. And, Jessica served as subject-matter expert for American Management Association’s course on leading virtual teams.

» Jessica's Blog

VCW will be broadcasting this session via live streaming video. To find out more or to join the webcast, download the flyer (pdf)

Health information technology (HIT) is consuming the work plans and budgets of healthcare organizations across the country. Networks are in a strategic position to help their members meet the myriad of IT-related requirements, including Meaningful Use Stages 1 and 2, health information exchanges (HIE) and patient and community engagement, to name a few. Join us as we discuss how networks across the country are dramatically enhancing the implementation of health IT into rural facilities across the country.

*Learning Objective 1: After this presentation, attendees will gain awareness of strategies used by successful HIT networks in the development their networks.

*Learning Objective 2: After this presentation, attendees will understand how to communicate the rules and regulations surrounding health IT to their membership, and plan how they can best support members.

*Learning Objective 3: After this presentation, attendees will have heard from their peers and fellow NCHN members about the work they are doing to meaningfully impact health IT adoption in their rural communities.

» about Marcia Green
» about Joe Wivoda

Our rural and frontier community based network impacts our residents in many ways. We will share our methods for communication and cooperation.

The rural communities in far western Kansas are geographically isolated from major metropolitan areas. What they lack in population is made up in cooperation as community based healthcare providers from different services work together to care for patients. The network includes a critical access hospital, two rural health clinics, a local pharmacy, health department and volunteer EMT groups. The implementation of health information technology will enhance work processes but it is the existing relationships that really make the partnership work.
Representatives from our multidisciplinary team will share strategies and best practices for working together effectively with limited manpower and multiple obligations.

Learning Objectives:

• Unique strategies for communication – email, internet, text, web based strategies
  
• Cooperative strategies to removing duplicate work processes
  
• Manage Community events and special projects – health fair, county fair, recruiting, mentoring, school physicals, Healthy moments, Integrated Behavioral health
  
• Your regulation is my regulation – how can we work together to share the burden of regulations with a limited work load? - CHNA, meaningful use, disease reporting, heart safe community

» about Chrysanne Grund
» about Dr. Wendell Ellis
» about Lisa Moritz, RN
» about Chris Baber, EMT

The Sherman Act, Clayton Act, and other federal Antitrust Laws prohibit business conduct that harms competition. While this is a laudable goal, the “Devil’s in the details”. Seemingly benign conduct can sometimes inadvertently cross the line from “legal” to “illegal”. This is particularly true when otherwise separate competing organizations come together to undertake joint activity. The typical healthcare network is, however, just such an arrangement. Therefore, both networks and their members need to be aware of the antitrust “Do’s” and “Don’t’s” to avoid crossing the line.

We are also in a period when mergers, consolidations, and similar steps to integrate previously separate healthcare organizations are on the rise.  A side effect of this trend has been increased federal antitrust scrutiny and enforcement.  Combining any two previously independent competitors increases the market power of the combined entity, and can have potentially anticompetitive effects, and thus trigger antitrust challenges.

In short, healthcare networks and their members can unwittingly find themselves “targets”.  The best protection is knowledge of the laws and the specific conduct that needs to be avoided.

The purpose of this Interactive Workshop is to arm you with the knowledge to avoid “risky” conduct and to provide practical “best practices” to avoid inadvertent mistakes and assure that your organization doesn’t need to say, “But officer, I didn’t really mean . . . “ to cross the antitrust line.

» about Heman Marshall, III

Value propositions help health networks forge meaningful, sustainable partnerships with their members. This mini-workshop will be beneficial to integrated vertical networks because we will reflect on the value we provide our members and how we can communicate it effectively. Using an interactive format, this mini-workshop will engage participants around the following learning objectives:

1. What are value propositions and why are they important to integrated vertical health networks?
2. What are the challenges to developing value propositions for integrated vertical health networks?
3. Participants will review and experiment with a step-by-step worksheet they can use to create value propositions in their own network.

The key take-away from this mini-workshop will be a step-by-step outline networks can follow to craft their own value propositions to members, funders, or any audience.

» about Cassalyn David, MPH

Hear directly from a fellow network leader about a standards-based method to examine organizational performance of networks in key areas. The I-STAR method (Integrated System for Transformation, Appreciation, and Renewal) developed by the Center for Educational Development and Project Concern International helps networks examine proficiency, motivation, and utilization across these key competencies for sustainability.

Established and emerging networks can benefit from I-STAR’s methodology, designed to assess network core competencies including: network learning, planning, administrative quality, advocacy, resource generation, and leadership. Gail Emrick, Director of the Southeast AZ Area Health Education Center (SEAHEC), has used this method with Networks as diverse as the binational Arizona Border Communities Health Network to rural Latin American reproductive health and development agencies.

She discusses its value as a Network and organizational capacity building tool.

Learning objectives:

1. Why is it important for networks to engage in self-evaluation ?
   
2. What is the I-STAR methodology and how can it be adapted to my network?
   
3. How the I-STAR’s standards for highly functioning organizations and networks can clarify strengths and challenges and lead to consensus around priorities and action steps.

Participants will gain an understanding of I-STAR and how they might adapt it for their network as well as an example of one of I-STAR’s tools.

» about Gail Emrick

Rural health professionals must engage in evidenced based practices that directly improve the health of farm families. Recognizing their critical role, health professionals joined forces in 2003 to create a national non-profit network known as the AgriSafe Network. AgriSafe aims to shift the quality of health care towards an occupational approach so that farmers can receive the same occupational care afforded to other industries.

AgriSafe formed a formal network so that services could be seamlessly adapted at the local, state and national level. During the last three years, AgriSafe launched a state-based initiative to prepare a workforce of rural providers in the field of occupational agricultural health. Clinical resources, advanced training programs, outreach services and distance education are core components of this innovative occupational health initiative.

AgriSafe fosters partnerships with universities, agribusiness, media organizations, church & civic organizations, agricultural extension, mental health practitioners, and other service professionals. AgriSafe’s collaborative approach to public health care delivery demonstrates how critical it is for diverse organizations to work together to bring the best preventive services to at-risk populations and should be considered a model for agriculturally-based communities throughout the nation.

Objectives of the session:

• Identify state and local champions who can retain their organizational identity while supporting your mission.
• Maintain creative brand identity among a competitive non-profit environment
• Recognize funding opportunities that support national movements with state affiliations

» about Natalie Roy

"Marketing" is a relatively concrete term, but how you actually do can be more obscure. Come to this session to learn how to create and implement an effective marketing plan for your network!

Marketing our network to current and potential members is something that we all do…or it’s on a ‘to do’ list…or we know we should do it…or we haven’t thought about it at all. Regardless of which category you fall in to, come join us at this session as we walk through how to create and implement an effective network marketing plan.

The session will include a discussion of the critical components of a marketing plan, including: competitive analysis, competitive advantage, defining your target market, and developing a value proposition. The work required to complete each component will also be covered. Handouts and activities will be provided to participants so they can begin to create their own strategic marketing plan for their network.

This will be an interactive session from which participants can take the concepts they learn and apply them, with the provided tools, directly to completing/rejuvenating their own marketing plan.

» about Sally Trnka
» about Randy Jacobs
» about Stacie Pace

This presentation is for everyone who knows they need to address the abstract, complex and generally unpleasant topic of wellness (both personal and organizational), but, given the choice, would rather have a root canal without any anesthetic because it would be less painful and probably more productive.  This surprising and entertaining interactive presentation will change the way you think about personal health and organizational wellness and will provide you with high-value take-away tools and techniques to share with your networks and partners. 

Today, NCHN member networks and their strategic partners are asked to accomplish more with less. And like all employers, you need to find ways to manage costs, boost productivity and improve overall efficiency. Your single best strategy to meet today’s challenges and achieve these outcomes is to improve the health and well-being of your most important resource, your human capital—the real people living real lives who enable you to fulfill your mission.

Sustainable lifestyle behavior change occurs when individuals and organizations are actively engaged in honest, positive and empowering conversations about health and well-being. This isn’t just theory. For the past seven years, LoneStart Wellness has partnered with the Texas Organization of Rural & Community Hospitals to promote these conversations in rural communities across Texas. We’ve shown that most people will join a voluntary movement to improve their health and that of their families so long as they believe they are receiving valid information, have genuine organizational support and can have the realistic expectation of success. 

Improving the health status of the providers and recipients of our finite healthcare resources is now an imperative.  This is an opportunity to learn how we can take a leadership role on this critically important issue—and have some fun while we’re at it.

» about Jay Seifert, M.A.