Artificial intelligence’s potential dominates conversations about the future of healthcare and all that is possible, not only to improve clinical care for patients but also to help address other challenges such as workforce. Although AI holds enormous promise, the overarching concern is that it can also produce unintended consequences. Advisers carefully note that these powerful tools will require leaders to be thoughtful and intentional about their use.
As with any technology, its ability to transform us and the way we work begins with the end in mind. Goals and intentions need to be clear and account for the delicate balances in play: privacy and transparency, caution and disruption, peppered with how to calibrate the pace of change inherent in the utility of anything new. These are tough needles to thread as leaders look to innovate, while at the same time seeking to ensure that we build technology anchored firmly in the benefits of those we serve.
ACHE, too, though different in scope and reach, is firmly committed to using the best technology has to offer to transform your experiences with us. With the support and guidance from the ACHE Board of Governors, we crafted a plan to provide unparalleled experiences as our Strategic Plan suggests. Our journey outlines an ambitious plan to update our membership customer relationship management system, and launch a new website with refreshed branding and a new digital infrastructure to better customize your experiences. In doing so, we want to ensure that ACHE is your first choice for robust, personalized leadership resources that will help you achieve your goals today and into the future. Our technology transformation is guided by three priorities to help us navigate this journey and stay on course.
Purposeful and personal. In every decision, we are using best practices to create a modern, integrated and personalized digital experience, with you and your needs at the center. Powered by a more agile membership system, our new website will be the entry point, and every visit should be frictionless and user-friendly to enable easy searching, browsing and accessing of customized resources and solutions we offer leaders and organizations. The site will illustrate who we are and what we stand for to inspire busy leaders and propel them forward in their work. Our refreshed branding will be a reflection of you, and we want you to see yourself in the stories we tell with every click and scroll.
Secure and convenient. Privacy and accessibility are priorities as we update our platforms and re-engineer our business. We want to meet you where you are—on mobile or desktop—while providing security and confidentiality at every step. Data-driven insights will support relevant and timely product innovation to enhance the leader journey. Data integrity is a critical piece, and we are working to ensure a leader database with respect for accuracy, consistency and validity, along with privacy and attention to personalization. We envision a system agile enough to accommodate the many ways we serve you and our field but also able to adapt to opportunities for new ways to do business as they emerge.
Evaluated and improved. The ultimate test of our digital transformation is whether it enables us to fulfill our promise to you, and you can help us with that. In the coming months, we will be asking for your feedback about our new platforms and your suggestions to strengthen them. These systems will be effective only if those using them find them valuable; they will evolve based on what you tell us, and we are excited to have you on our journey in developing them.
This transformation will be a focus all year as we work to implement these systems, with design and development underway this spring. Testing and feedback gathering will come in the third and fourth quarters, followed by sharpening and refining as we work toward going live in early 2025. Technology can be a formidable partner, and we look forward to harnessing its power to deliver unparalleled experiences for you.
Deborah J. Bowen, FACHE, CAE, is president/CEO of the American College of Healthcare Executives (dbowen@ache.org).