Whenever you’re able to turn a task into a game, it becomes exponentially more enjoyable to accomplish. That’s why Tina Ratliff, Prochant’s Pharmacy Reimbursement Manager, came by The Modern Healthcare Back Office to discuss the benefits of gamifying back-office work.
Gamifying consists of adding morale boosting challenges to help streamline a particular RCM process. This approach helps employees get to know each other better, which ultimately leads to them developing stronger personal relationships.
Get Caught Up
Infusion pharmacies use gamifying to concentrate on a specific task when work begins to pile up. For example, your over 90+ A/R is growing out of control, but you feel adequately staffed to handle the amount of claims that need to be addressed. Turn the task into a competition! Split your collectors up by payer and have each group's goal be to reduce their overall 90+ A/R each month.
Most pharmacies do something similar to this already, but the work just isn't getting done. However, adding an incentive—“whichever group performs the best or reaches the desired goal will get taken out to lunch”—will help you see improved results.
Make It Measurable
When divvying up the assignment, make sure you're able to track each person's individual contributions. Providing physical evidence of a clear-cut winner will prevent any potential disagreements from taking place. Take an anonymous poll among participants to make sure they're incentivized to compete for the reward.
Help Processes Evolve
A common result of gamifying a back-office process is employees will often think outside the box to achieve their performance goal. Adding a competitive element gets people's wheels turning when it comes to discovering new, more efficient ways of completing a task.
Gamifying also presents an opportunity for overachievers to go above and beyond to complete substantial amounts of work that otherwise wouldn't get done. If your company has some real go-getters, you can set some secondary bonuses for them to compete over.
Implementing gamification into your revenue cycle management practices takes minimal amounts of time and typically receives little to no resistance from employees. Gamifying tends to create a rare phenomenon where employees become enthusiastic about receiving additional work.
Hear about all the advantages this strategy provides and how to properly introduce it to your staff by listening to the full podcast episode:
Prochant has a proven track record of helping HME and pharmacy providers meet their financial goals. Our scalable solutions, years of experience, and advanced technology provide best-in-class results to the healthcare community. Headquartered in Charlotte, North Carolina, our client base includes national pharmacy and HME providers and health systems.