Specialization:
The Key to Crothall’s Success

To deliver a program of exceptional quality, you need experienced managers focusing their talents on what they do best.

The benefits of outsourcing support services in the health care industry are well-known. In order to deliver the best possible patient care, hospital administrators are making the strategic decision to focus hospital resources on core competencies and hire outside specialists to take care of the rest. Many support services vendors offer an integrated service model, which blurs the line between service departments to deliver a single package. Although this model can be tempting, hospital administrators should study their options carefully to ensure they are not putting up-front cost savings ahead of long-term quality.

Who Does the Integrated Services Model Benefit?

It can be difficult to distinguish between vendors on paper. Although most hospital administrators base their decision to outsource primarily on quality, an opportunity to cut costs can be compelling. Cost is often the best leverage that some companies can use to win new business. A vendor interested in a lucrative Food Services contract is often willing to offer cost savings in other services, such as Housekeeping.

For the vendor, the benefits are obvious. It can secure a larger overall contract and get a foot in the door, even when it is unable to guarantee the same level of quality as its competitors. It can pay a single on-site manager to oversee all services, and even shuffle front line staff among several departments to fill staffing needs. It can even sell this concept as a way to "broaden" the skill set of its associates.

Specialization Is Key

The fact remains that each of the different support services has a unique culture and required skill set. A manager must have significant experience and hands-on knowledge to run a single department effectively. Even front-line staff cannot be sufficiently trained to deliver top-quality in more than one service. Shifting associates around to cover unfamiliar tasks is not the most efficient way to manage staffing levels. Crothall Executive Vice President Tom Racobaldo explains, "The reason clients contract with The benefits a vendor is because they are looking for expertise in the service provided. By combining services under one manager, you end up diluting the level of quality. There is no way for one manager to be an expert in many different services." When a vendor attempts to blend dissimilar services together, sharing staff, management, and processes, it ceases to be a specialist. It is important to keep in mind the primary goal of outsourcing: trusting support services to the most capable managers.

In the face of the integration trend, Crothall maintains our commitment to specialization. For over 15 years, Crothall has put tremendous resources into building up each of the different service lines it performs. Each service has its own dedicated division, so that every level of management from the front-line associate up to the Senior Vice President is experienced and focused to deliver the highest quality program.

Single Point of Contact

Crothall's response to the integrated model has been to develop our own solution, which remains faithful to specialization. In order to simplify the scope of management for the client, Crothall can appoint a General Manager to be the chief liaison with hospital administration. The GM performs the traditional role of the hospital's Director of Support Services: dealing with inter-departmental issues, coordinating the different services with respect to budgets and administration, and reporting directly to the hospital's COO. But the GM does not claim to be an expert in all services. That is why each department manager retains operational control over his respective service department.

Crothall's model combines the high quality of our specialist programs with the efficiencies of an integrated program. Through the smart management software of TeamCHIMES, different departments can integrate task scheduling and reporting, creating better communication and cooperation to improve patient throughput, bed turnaround, and response times for patient and staff requests.

Proven Success

At Crothall, we have based our success on specialization, delivering the highest quality, most efficient staffing, and people who are true experts in their fields. This is why 273-bed Deaconess Hospital in Cincinnati reached out to Crothall in 2006. With the partnership of sister company Morrison, which specializes in Food Services, Crothall delivers a broad range of services: Facilities Management, Environmental Services, and Patient Transportation. Deaconess could have chosen another vendor's integrated model. But Deaconess decided to stick with the experts.

Chief Operating Officer David Ferrell explains, "During the process of selecting an outsource contractor for our Guest Services at Deaconess Hospital, we looked for a company that had support and expertise available for each distinct discipline that we were purchasing, yet provided one internal point of contact so I could effectively supervise their efforts. Crothall has provided just that. I have separate regional support for each department, but I work with one General Manager who oversees the efforts of all three. This has been a very positive change for Deaconess Hospital."