Sponsored by Banner Health
By Bill Mauro
Moving quickly and safely to achieve the core mission of health care
Banner Imaging will reach the one-year anniversary of its Voice of the Customer (VoC) program this month. The program collects customer feedback in real-time for leaders to make process and service improvements. Banner Imaging is a part of Banner Health, a nonprofit health care system based in Phoenix, Arizona, which has set its mission to make health care easier, so life can be better.
In 2017, Banner Health started on its journey to improve customer care by transforming digital experiences to reduce the complexities for customers to manage their health care needs. The VoC implementation is one of several key digital initiatives Banner Health has embarked on to improve the care and experience customers receive. The VoC program has become a force multiplier for frontline leadership and continues to foster a service culture that influences customer perceptions across the continuum of care while elevating Banner Imaging as a place where radiology professionals want to work, radiologists want to practice and customers choose for their medical imaging needs.
Discovering what customers want is a cornerstone of Banner Imaging’s framework for success. As CEO Jason Theadore explains, “Customer service is part of our product. In health care, I think this often gets lost. We become so focused on our clinical delivery that we limit our focus.” To broaden their view of the customer, the Banner Imaging digital VoC program operates on a transactional basis to send email-to-web surveys 24 hours post-visit so results can be used as real-time feedback rather than lagging indicators. Net Promoter Score (NPS) is the key metric used. NPS is a relatively new take on measuring customer satisfaction in health care, but with the increased shoppable modalities and choice in the industry, understanding customer perceptions of care through brand loyalty gives Banner Imaging a leading edge on building better relationships and improving care. Focusing on customer perceptions in this way also helps frontline leaders hold themselves accountable to consistency of service, which helps build credibility over time with their customers.
Structurally, the VoC program consists of a fully automated, end-to-end reporting platform that includes real-time performance tracking, commentary review and a service recovery management system. The survey itself is rather short; on average, it only takes two minutes to complete. To-date, the business has delivered over 90,000 survey invitations and received nearly 30,000 completed surveys – an impressive 33% response rate. Customer perceptions are extremely favorable as well. Overall NPS is 85.5 with four of their 30 imaging centers reporting an NPS of 90 or higher.
A successful VoC program is more than metrics and Banner Imaging understands this well. In addition to performance tracking, they focus on celebrating their wins and recovering their losses. Their service recovery management system helps managers promptly follow-up on dissatisfied customer experiences after a service failure. The system automatically flags negative feedback and immediately notifies and directs managers to the customer’s details. Two percent of surveys are identified as service recovery opportunities and most are closed within 24 hours of notification. Frontline leaders use case forms to collect additional information at the time of recovery and are trackable for teams to prioritize pain points that need attention. This makes action planning easier and more effective while also keeping teams focused on improvement and learning from past mistakes.
The business also celebrates its wins with employee engagement efforts. A recognition system was established for employees who are called out for doing an outstanding job in customer commentary. Routinely, customer moments are shared in weekly updates, staff meetings, operations huddles and on enterprise social networking tools. All results are also accessible to frontline leaders to compare performance against one another. Naturally, a healthy rivalry between centers has spurred senior leadership to create a reward system that includes a traveling trophy to the imaging center with the highest NPS over the prior quarter. All these engagement efforts establish pride, morale and excitement that boosts overall performance.
Banner Imaging’s VoC program aides the business in relentless improvement and helps build a customer obsessed culture. In turn, customers are front and center during the decision-making process. Banner Imaging’s continued team member engagement and focus on perfecting the customer experience exemplifies Banner Health’s core mission to make health care easier, so life can be better.
