[00:00:02] Speaker A: Welcome to Health Data Talks, where industry experts offer bite sized tips and trends for managing legacy data.
[00:00:13] Speaker B: Hello. In this very special episode of Health Data Talks, we're making an incredible milestone. 20 years of Harmony healthcare it.
For two decades, Harmony has been navigating healthcare data through enormous industry change, new regulations, new platforms, new pressures, new expectations around trust, security and access.
Joining me today is Tom Liddell, chairman of the board, who has been part of Harmony's journey from the very beginning. Tom has had a front row seat to not only how health data management has evolved, but to how Harmony has remained grounded while everything around it has changed. This conversation is less about technology releases and more about perspective. What Tom has seen, learned, what he believes matters most as healthcare leaders look ahead.
So first and foremost, Tom, thanks for joining. Really looking forward to this conversation.
[00:01:02] Speaker A: Eric, thanks so much.
[00:01:05] Speaker B: So first question, let's go back to the beginning, right? And if you think about what Harmony was like back in those early days and you think back, what stands out to you the most? Where the healthcare data landscape was then compared to what it is today.
[00:01:25] Speaker A: That's an enormous question, Eric, and one that we probably could talk about for four hours at a time. But we'll try to keep our listeners, our listeners at least in a good place, something short. So when I think of the landscape, when you go back 20 years ago in the early 2000s, we are coming off of, I'm going to say first generation technologies.
We are in North America, at least not at the point yet where investments are being made in critical infrastructure for the automation of healthcare entities. Many more physicians and physician groups are private, interoperability as a concept interfaces and the like.
We're in full motion.
And the fragmentation of data was still pretty significant.
I, myself and Jim and some of the early team had spent some time in the exchange or health information exchange work that really was about the interconnectedness of data. And as we always said, get data to the right place, to the right provider and the quality of care improves, the experience of the patient improves and the overall cost of healthcare should reduce within those frameworks. And it's kind of been a core belief that we've had today, so market from that, which is systems. And I've got to automate things to move through that generation that was and is today.
I now have data coming from everything, right? From every part. Everything is about compute and about the data in the enterprise experience.
[00:03:29] Speaker B: Yeah, and here's a follow up question to that, Tom. At what point in, you know, this process when you again, you go back 20 years, the elements of meaningful use were at play. Just trying to get people to use an ehr, trying to connect data.
When was it that all of a sudden this notion of needing to be able to archive data differently started to emerge? Can you talk a little bit about that? Even as a core concept. Right. And even today, Right. You think about this notion of active archiving.
But I'm curious, when was it that the team started to see this as a real market need, even at a time when hospitals were still trying to just get connected or get up on using technology?
[00:04:22] Speaker A: Yeah, it's a great question and I'll try to frame it in time. So when Tim and I sort of said, let's put another shovel in the ground and make an investment in some of the team members that we had worked with before, we thought it was to build a broader health technology services group in the 2007, 8, 9 area, more about interconnectivity. And we started to see that, hey, much like you had paper in the paper era, where people had large storage containers and the need to access that, we started to say, there's this concept evolving that's probably going to have a need to decommission a digital enterprise.
I would then say the door opened where there was significant federal investment in the automation of electronic health records and the concept of meaningful use. And if anything, that sort of, from a clinical standpoint, started the fire or started the build for that. But people often then said, we always thought of it as, well, that it's all data, and it always has been for us, all data formats, that they all have to be managed and they all have that sort of concept around, around them of whether you call it legacy or whether you call it an evolving, you know, data infrastructure that, you know, that one might have.
[00:05:54] Speaker B: Excellent. Yeah. I mean, it's, it's fascinating the, you know, how that landscape has, has evolved truly to. And, and also being a team that sensed opportunities and saw a need for that in the marketplace, perhaps even before the market really even existed. Right. Maybe. Can you talk about what those early days of product look like in terms of the market and, and, and maybe from your perspective, you know, as you began to sense this, that there was a need in the market, what were customers looking for at that time?
And you know, some of those early conversations with some of those customers that you mentioned. Right.
What did the early product look like and what did it. And of course, we'll fast forward here a little bit in terms of what it is today, but back then, you know, what were we trying to solve?
[00:06:49] Speaker A: I think what I would. Well, couple of things.
Jim and I had good, great debate on what product framework should look like. And so we both kind of always had this idea that why couldn't you make it and think of it? Browsers were not that old, you know, in their first evolutions that you could build a browser based, you know, an Internet based viewer that had evolving standards around it. And if you're techie, you understand that the IO or the way that data gets interpreted, that could be a pretty challenging thing from a tech perspective. User interface, we thought web and I think we were early, early adopters in that because of performance and other things. When we thought about the layers of technology and oftentimes people have in the middle layers of their technology, we had some early inklings of let's do that right for that. Then it took us a while to evolve to a concept that you could have an open source kind of framework and architecture. But for us foundationally it was about reduction in cost and we didn't want to sort of get somebody trapped into that next, that next piece. So that was sort of the technology front that started to drive that.
[00:08:14] Speaker B: Excellent.
You know, certainly when you think about some of the building blocks that it takes to create a great company, you know, number one, you need to have a great product, right?
You got to have great people, you've got to have a great sense of culture and of course you have have to have a relevant problem to solve.
I've got an easy question.
Maybe can you talk a little bit about the notion of what, what was behind the name of Harmony Healthcare, it And can you talk about that a little bit?
[00:08:52] Speaker A: Sure, sure.
Great question.
I wouldn't say that it was with exacting science that we came to it. And in fact, I think people would probably say it's a bit of an interesting name.
But the core roots of it came in the notion that we would harmonize data, that we would bring, you know, bring that which is disparate to something that you might look and go, well, I fit all these pieces in maybe on an individual line that music doesn't sound quite right or that data doesn't feel quite right, but when you knit it all together, that experience is singular and has one, one voice. So you kind of see it threaded through the, the teams and I'll speak to the companies, people in evolution, but certainly as well through the product. And you know that if data were notes, we've got a place for all of that, all those kinds of notes and all those kinds of sounds or all those kinds of data points within the architecture.
The other kind of second thread, if you will, on that was just the notion of if your patient data as a person is harmonized or is in context and you see it evolving in the platforms and products that are today, the early concepts of portals and PHRs and the like for that. But essentially saying, can I have my digital data available in that experience and can that data be available to providers and the like that we felt like that was an important thread and in those days where we're building, you know, interfaces and somebody says, well, it's amazing. I'm getting actually results that I've been carboned on that are landing in my records and, you know, that makes for a better experience. I pick up a particular fact or something, something like that.
Let me speak to a little bit of the, the origins of the, of the group.
You know, you've got to have a little different.
You know, you have different places when you're a 1 to 30 company people and when you're a 30 to 50 and you know, 50 to 150, and then you get up to 250, 300 and 500 and 1000. There's different stages in an organization that people would have, and sometimes the people and personalities have to have different fits. You know, it might feel, it might feel better, you know, being somebody in a smaller thing where they get to touch just about everything.
And some people are drawn to that. Others are drawn to having great leadership roles where they can manage five or ten thousand people within that. Those people tend to have a different set of talents and characteristics than maybe some of those people that are creating that art in those early days. So we were fortunate, and I think we're fortunate to have a little bit of that blend continue today. But there's three or four things I would point you toward. I think the first one is we worked really hard on trust and trust in the sense of the work that people to our left and right and up and down were doing. Not that we couldn't question it or couldn't go back and forth about it, but that's foundational for us.
The other word that comes to my mind and you have to have it is you've really got to have grit to withstand it, right? You got to have grit to go, we're going to evolve to that next thing or we're going to make that right payroll or we're going to do what it takes until 2 in the morning to get that presentation right. So that when we're on, you know, at 8:30 or in front of somebody, that it's right. Even though we thought we had it right a week ago for that, and in product and in deep infrastructure and technologies that are there for that. So those two words, you know, this concept of team, not so much from rah, rah team, because I think you probably worked with me. There's times when I'm very positive and thankful.
There's probably more times when I've got my sleeves rolled up and just like, we got to get this right. We. We can be better as a team and kind of pushing ourselves toward that. You know, within that, there's two other principles. You know, we've got. We've got four or five core values, but, you know, two come to mind. In some of those early things, we've always been about doing the right thing. Not necessarily like, oh, it's got to deliver the final return for us. It will. If you do it right over time, you know, those, Those things happen. In fact, they happen even better because they're built, you know, built in stronger foundations for that. And then this just concept of I believed it and I think our team believes it is just, just never be too proud to serve in any capacity, you know, within that. So if a trash can needs emptying, go empty it. If somebody needs help on a presentation, do it. If, if you want somebody to take a look at product, do that. If they need training and education, help them through that. But just be willing to serve, you know, with. Within that and those, Those core principles I see, I see alive in the, in the people that we have today.
[00:14:22] Speaker B: Yeah, excellent. I was going to bring up the core values and you beat me to it. So.
No, those have been consistently lived. Right.
And that's my impression, even though I've only been here for a short period of time, relative to the entire history, those have been pillars for the company, pillars that have continued to be reinforced, pillars that, that we expect people to carry out their work by. Right.
And, you know, there has to be some sort of enduring capacity to that. That, that certainly started, you know, way back when, if you think about that.
And as we continue to evolve, grow, expand, the mission and reputation along with that has really stayed consistent.
You know, if you were to comment on just simply, you know, what's been, you know, one of the most important aspects associated with maintaining that. What comes to mind for you when you think about those kinds of things? You did, you mentioned core values as a big part of that, but maybe can you talk a little bit about the mission associated with it and I've always felt like Harmony has been a mission driven company.
Can you comment on what that's been like from the early days and even to today?
[00:15:55] Speaker A: Sure, sure. Well, I'm going to take a little different angle on that and say we deliver on our mission and we can talk about that and be ashamed to hear your perspective, but I'm going to take it from the standpoint of production.
I think one of the best ways to live out a mission is to think about what you're trying to produce and measure from the earliest of days.
As I started working in the day to day, I said, what are we about? Well, we're about the agreement that we had to do what we said we were going to do in a timely, organized fashion that exceeds expectations, which you'll find in our core values. But in a way that is if we internally buy into that, producing a deployment, upgrading servers, being able to measure quality and the experience and be willing to have success where we have success, or if we don't be willing to look and analyze that the foundation of your mission will only grow and get stronger for that.
It's by design that we look and say we're going to measure and we're going to make commitments to produce. I think when you talk about what differentiates us today, I think that is probably one of the top two or three things. I think our product certainly does. The way we can deploy it with its flexibility and capability exceeds candidly what most other companies are even conceptualizing without there. But I think most importantly our willingness to say we're going to get you from A to B, we're going to build out a programmed experience.
And I think it comes back consistently whether it's measured publicly or whether we measure it internally. I think we've had some between 1,000 and 2,000 in line interviews about people's experience in those data points. And that drives experience that also drives what can differentiate, you know, for that and in that production, in that measured production, really, really important results, you know, for that.
Lastly, I would say, you know, one other thing that's kind of been our secret sauce. And I've just always, it's been with me since, honestly I just sort of stumbled into it.
You know, when I started a First business around 30 was just get together weekly, get together with your management team, talk and huddle. And you know, before it was vogue to do all that, I just felt like it was really foundationally important and go around the business and Talk about things that are going to get you there.
Secondly, and I love the concept as we grow, but, you know, just a couple of times a month, if you're somebody who wants to be in and grow in a business, we do these standups that have grow and they're that full 360 view that is foundational to trust. We basically tell any employee in the business where we're going and where we're headed with a great deal of confidence, and we ask them to join in. And I think whether you have a family or whether you have a group of people that you're around, if there's communication across the business from underneath, from the people that run it, you're gonna. You're gonna build something that differentiates.
[00:19:50] Speaker B: Yeah, totally agree. And I'm fortunate enough to be a part of that, which is always exciting in terms of how we can engage the entire company every two weeks.
I think I've got one more question for you here, Tom, and that is, of course, as we enter this next chapter, what gets you excited?
And you know, not just for the company, but for our customers, our partners, you know, the people that you worked with alongside for so long.
What excites you about the direction of where Harmony continues to go?
[00:20:28] Speaker A: Well, gosh, there's three or four things. The first one I'm going to say is I love the team that's in place and the additions that we've made. Eric, folks like yourself, so the management team, you know, has all the capabilities to take us to places that I can imagine, but, you know, I can't imagine because I think, you know, the.
What you're going to do as a team and lifting this next chapter, the next five, 10 and 20 years, I believe, I believe will take us to places like we've done so far that you would, you would not expect. Right? Where you'd have, you know, 500 health systems and thousands of, you know, data. Billions of data points, you know, candidly, you know, under. Underneath that. So that's the first one, I think. The second one, you talk about opportunity. We live in a time today that is, you know, both, both, you know, a bit fearful, but I think just has opportunity like, like we have never experienced.
And so for me, it's always been embrace the next thing, try to learn it and figure it out. Try to figure out what your station is in that.
And I think as a company, I expect we're going to continue to do that and apply.
I don't want to talk about it in the lens of AI I just think of it in terms of the broadening of opportunity for that.
And if we as an organization think about that with an open lens and with the idea that we don't fear it, but that we embrace it, that we should grow and dynamically we should be back to our foundational things, which is back to our mission, which is to improve the lives of the people that we serve. We serve the patient, we serve that provider, we serve that health system. We reduce costs, we improve the connection of that data.
We've evolved to where there's a conceptual data platform that has just about everything that you would have. And when we go back to that person that we serve, they may not know we even served them today, but we've done that conversion. Right. Or we make sure that that little piece of data from 10 years ago, which is really relevant in some very critical care, you know, has shown up in that. Right. In that. Right. Capacity for that. And lastly, just that the team looks and says, I work for a great place that has a lot of great beliefs and that wants to do things in a very positive, you know, go forward nature.
[00:23:09] Speaker B: Yeah, love that.
Well, we're going to go ahead and close up podcast today.
Tom, thank you so much for sharing, obviously, your perspective and wisdom associated with the business and for helping build something that's clearly meant a great deal to many organizations and people, employees, customers over the years.
To our listeners, thank you for joining us as we reflect on 20 years of Harmony Healthcare IT and look ahead to what's next. So thank you for joining today.
[00:23:40] Speaker A: Thanks, Eric. See you later.
That's it for this session of Health Data Talks. Check out helpful
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