Government Bits

Tracking how technology is transforming interaction between governments and citizens.

Occasionally, a company may face a disruptive market shift that forces it to adapt in order to remain competitive (think Blockbuster). But seldom does an entire industry experience multiple simultaneous game changers, like those that the health insurance market faces today in the US.

Beyond the looming uncertainty of the Supreme Court’s pending rule on the Affordable Care Act (ACA), there are several other seismic catalysts forcing private payers to reevaluate the ways they service their customers.  The most obvious of which is the customers themselves.

Evolving expectations are dictating that companies in most industries shift resources to account for new “always connected” stakeholders. As digital consumers, we have all grown accustomed to conducting business our way, on our terms. And why should the business of healthcare be any different?

When implemented properly, digital marketing aims to identify personal interests and trends, and deliver unique experiences that resonate with each customer across multiple channels.

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But unlike most other industries, health payers also have a vested interest in education and member outreach (some would argue that it’s actually a responsibility), since the offline lifestyle decisions of their consumers directly impact their bottom line. In a nutshell, acute medical emergencies are much more expensive than preventative health maintenance.

Additionally, the Medical Loss Ratio (MLR) provision of the ACA stipulates that insurers shall spend at least 80-85% of their premium income on healthcare claims and quality improvement activities.  That leaves 15-20% for administrative expenses, including marketing.  In fact, it is estimated that private payers who fail to comply will issue consumer rebates totaling over $1 billion by August. So, now more than ever, it is imperative for payers to internally optimize efficiencies and develop effective marketing strategies that deliver measurable results.

In the long run, these changes are expected to result in affordable care for a healthier population. And as other provisions of the ACA significantly expand the pool of new customers for health insurers, the most successful organizations will be those who effectively navigate the changing landscape to build relationships with their customers, rather than continuing to simply facilitate transactions.

Tell us what you think. Drop us a line anytime on Twitter @AdobeGov and @AdobeDigMktg.

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Adobe Government Assembly (AGA) is our premier corporate event to demonstrate commitment to the US Public Sector community, announce product launches/pipeline, and highlight collaborative successes with our partners across the country in federal, state, and local markets.

This year, with speakers, panelists, and customers representing almost every segment of the US Public Sector, the 2012 AGA in Washington DC proved to be a dynamic forum for exploring trends that are clearly driving the federal government’s innovative technology agenda, including ‘cloud-first’ policies, Analytics for Measuring Agency Performance, data center consolidation initiatives, and Mobile Government.

AGA session tracks were designed around the following three pillars of relevant challenges that government agencies face day-to-day as well: engaging communities through new technologies, achieving efficiencies during a time of significant budget constraints, and the threat paradigm of data security.

For example, I spoke on a popular panel that delved into the topic of improving agency efficiencies by automating mission-critical business processes.  John Montel, a co-panelist from the US Department of the Interior, detailed how DOI recently implemented Adobe solutions to modernize ways citizens interact with his agency.

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Other AGA highlights included an insightful keynote presentation from LtCol Greg Reeder, Director of Marine Corps production for the US Marines, in which he demonstrated how the Marine Corps is leveraging Adobe technologies for apps that engage a new generation of service members, veterans, and prospective recruits.

From policy makers to agency executives, AGA 2012 offered something for everyone involved in government technology. We offer our sincere appreciation to all customers, partners, and attendees who made AGA 2012 the best one yet. And based on the incredible feedback, we’re already looking forward to repeating our success next month in Ottawa at the 2012 Canadian AGA.  See you there!

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Scroll to see the full US AGA 2012 agenda and links to several of the event’s most popular sessions:

Track 1: Engaging Communities – The Soldier, the Veteran, the Citizen

Connecting with citizens, soldiers and constituents is no longer about connecting anything – not telephones, computers or even devices. As federal agencies integrate new technologies like mobility and web analytics into the fabric of their infrastructure, they are breaking past the old paradigms of communication to reach people wherever they are – connecting the mission to those that make it happen.

Session 1-1: The Next-Generation Mobile Government Experience Part II

Session 1-2: Measuring Agency Online Presence to Improve the End User Experience

Track 2: Achieving Agency Efficiency

With the federal government facing unprecedented budget strains, the call to “do more with less” is becoming deafening. As the prospect of cuts accelerates, agencies are now turning to technology to bridge the gaps. New tools are enabling collaboration on an unprecedented scale, from the desktop to the battlefield, while advances in areas like training are redefining how agencies prepare their employees for the future. But these developments are not limited to internal stakeholders; citizens are reaping the benefits of more efficient data processing and forms management, cutting out the time and the paperwork that stands between them and efficient delivery of services. The sessions in this track will explore this new definition of efficiency and how significant savings can result from real performance improvements.

Session 2-1: Bridging the Divide: Collaboration and Training

Session 2-2: Reforming Forms: Accelerating Agency Performance with Data Management

Track 3: Content-Centric Security – Defining the Next Threat Paradigm

Securing information has always been a mission of government, but keeping data behind lock and key no longer cuts it. The value of information is now defined as much by how it’s exchanged as where it’s locked away. That’s why sharing information securely – across the agency, across the government or even across the world – and ad hoc analysis to identify a particular threat, have emerged as the most critical elements of today’s security challenge.

Session 3-1: Unknown Unknowns – A New Class of Analytics

Session 3-2: IT Security is Who You Are, Not Where You Are

Re-visit the most popular sessions. To see the full archived videos, log in as a guest:

• Leveraging Digital Media
• Content-level Security
• Analytics 2.0
• Performance-Enhancing Data Management
• Mobile Government
• Maximizing Online Presence

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A funny thing is happening on the way to health reform; the business of healthcare in the US is gradually coming of age. Although not without its share of trials and challenges, a developing trend of comprehensive outcomes-based models are now shedding light on age-old issues like care delivery and payment structures.
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These new “shared savings” models, which in the most basic explanations are simplified as “pay for treatment quality vs. quantity,” aim to motivate providers who voluntarily differentiate themselves by shifting focus to improving patient care while reducing avoidable costs over time, and away from being solely incentivized on a fee-for-service basis. The models, including Accountable Care Organizations (ACO), Patient Centered Medical Homes (PCMH), and Programs of All-Inclusive Care for the Elderly (PACE), offer the potential for transformational change through connected health. They each subscribe to the concept that coordination of all available resources will keep the patient as healthy as possible while significantly bolstering efficiency and strengthening the physician-patient relationship.
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The ACO model, for example, establishes a team of primary care physicians, specialists, and hospitals that ensure patients receive the right care at the right time while reducing acute episodes, avoiding unnecessary duplication of services, and preventing medical errors that often result from miscommunication between providers. Then, any resulting savings are shared among each of the participants, so long as pre-established benchmarks for quality are achieved.

In order to deliver such measurable results, however, it is imperative that all stakeholders share clinical and case management data for better informed decision making. Coordination of comprehensive healthcare services across the care continuum, particularly for chronically ill patients, must also be implemented.  To that end, the Affordable Care Act (ACA) of 2010 authorizes Medicare to contract with ACOs in a Medicare Shared Savings Program.

Adobe recently sponsored the 2012 Accountable Care and Health IT Summit in Miami to facilitate open dialogue and explore the technology requirements for delivering on such an innovative concept.

The summit provided a dynamic forum for policy makers, leading Health IT strategists, and ACO early adopters to share critical insights into the process automation and integration of clinical documentation, financial systems, and payment workflows across multiple digital channels.

We extend thanks to all who attended and contributed to making the summit an overwhelming success.  As always, we’re interested in your perspective.  Tell us how your agency or organization is preparing for the era of Accountable Care.

Drop us a line on Twitter at @AdobeGov and @AdobeCEM, or on Facebook.

Late last week, we hosted an event, along with Carahsoft and Blue Beacon Consulting, focused on the use of social media in the U.S. Department of Defense.

The event – Transitioning from “Social Media” to “Mission Media”: Using Social Media to Achieve DoD Missions – included a great keynote by Maxine Teller (@mixtmedia) and informative panel including our own Rob Pinkerton and:

• Dana Clark (@PAODanaClark), social media manager, public affairs specialist, Army Corps of Engineers
• Dr. Joseph Boutte, strategic advisor, Strategies, New Media and Collaboration, TASC Inc.
• Dan Wade, social media and new technology chief for strategic communication, USSOCOM
• Christopher Zember, deputy director, Information Analysis Centers, OASD(R&E), DTIC
• Bill Annibell @billannibell), chief technology officer, Sapient Government Services (Moderator)

We had a chance to catch some time on camera with Maxine, Dana and Rob to capture their thoughts on the topics of discussion and the event. Check it out:

As always, we’re interested in your thoughts. Keep in touch with us here, on Twitter @AdobeGov ,and on Facebook, where we’ve posted some pictures from the event.

As we’ve posted about several times in the recent past (including here and here), the Adobe Gov UK team has been holding a series of webinars focused on the public sector.

The importance of open standards to the future of public sector ICT was the latest topic, for an event that took place on August 31. The event covered whether open standards finally allow the public sector to join up service delivery, what standards are key, and how will they be decided.

The panel included:

• Bill McCluggage, Deputy Government CIO and Director of ICT Strategy & Policy at the Cabinet Office
• Mark Brett, Policy & Programme Manager at Socitm
• Marc Straat, Adobe’s European Head of Standards
• Helen Olsen, Managing Editor, UKauthorITy and IT in Use magazine

An on-demand version of the webinar is now available here; we encourage you to check it out. And to participate in future webinars in the series see the ITU Live registration site here.

As always, keep in touch with the AdobeGov team on Twitter @AdobeGov.

Last week I had the opportunity to hear Linda Cureton (@curetonl), NASA CIO, at FedScoop’s 3^rd Annual Lowering the Cost of Government with IT Summit in Washington DC, an event at which I also spoke (see the brief video we shot below). Linda was the first speaker of the morning and her presentation really resonated with me and the way we at Adobe are trying to help agencies lower the cost of government. She grabbed my attention early on, admittedly after a tough morning at the house, with her admonition “don’t eat your young”.  She made many other great points such as: Don’t be penny-wise and pound foolish; and Measure twice, cut once. However, it was her “don’t eat your young” statement that I want to concentrate on for this post.     

Linda made the point to urge her peers to view innovation as critical for survival. I couldn’t agree more during these times of budget cuts, budget deficits, and the necessity of having to do more with less. As IT leaders, this is the time to innovate. History teaches us that we have always come out of crisis periods stronger and this will be no different.  As government IT leaders, we’ve got to change our way of thinking and Linda drove this point home for me and the audience. Innovation comes from every part of the organization, young, old or just plain-old middle aged like me. As Linda noted, we must encourage new money-saving ideas to continue to provide the services our citizens need.

There’s been much written as of late regarding the consumerization of IT, especially in regards to consolidation and virtualization of our data centers and infrastructures. As Linda noted in her presentation, the low-hanging fruit has been picked. I agree. Government agencies I speak to regularly have all standardized on commodity technologies like virtualization, storage, and networking. We’ve got to move up the stack now and focus on the application layer and how we can consumerize that and make it easier for citizens to engage with their governments on their terms (in person, on the phone, or online) and device (PC, Mac, tablet, mobile). If you’re a government IT leader and you’re looking for ways to save money, look no further. Driving citizen interactions online and off of the phone or a piece of paper will save you money. However, it does take thought and measurement.

That’s what we’re focused on at Adobe, trying to help government agencies move more and more of their interactions online. To drive that online adoption you’ve got to simplify and make that online experience engaging and intuitive. If it’s too hard to figure out online, I know what I personally do. I either skip to another site (not an option for citizens) or I hop on the phone (an expensive option for agencies). At Adobe, we help governments create rich online content with the world’s best digital editing tools. We help move this content online and streamline business processes with best of breed enterprise solutions like the Adobe Digital Enterprise Platform, which helps you leverage the current investments you’ve made in ERP and document management systems. After you’ve moved content and business processes online you need to ensure people like me aren’t abandoning your site because it’s too hard or complicated. We help ensure that doesn’t happen with our Online Marketing Suite. As Linda might say we help you measure twice and cut once, be penny wise, and also help keep your young safe and sound…

Earlier this year, the TechAmerica Foundation comprised a group of thought leaders to serve on the Commission on the Leadership Opportunity in U.S. Deployment of the Cloud (CLOUD2). The Commission’s three-month mandate was to provide the Obama Administration with recommendations for how government should deploy cloud technologies and for public policies that will help drive U.S. innovation in the cloud.

On July 26, the Commission released its recommendations in a report (.pdf) on its site and at events in a few locations across the U.S., including Washington, D.C. A shorter summary of the report is also available from the TechAmerica Foundation site.

Our own Barry Leffew, VP of Public Sector, was among the 71 Commissioners who lent their expertise and participated in the process of developing the recommendations.

Barry attended the Washington, D.C. event last week and also spoke as part of a panel arranged by BMC Software, which also had representation among the Commissioners. In addition to Barry, the panel included Commissioners from BMC, Red Hat, Inc., Cisco Systems, and Harris Corp.

We caught up with Barry at the CLOUD2 event to capture his thoughts on the Commission, the recommendations and the BMC panel on which he sat. Check out the video below.

As always, we’re interested in your thoughts and continuing the conversation on CLOUD2 and otherwise. Keep in touch with us on Twitter @AdobeGov and our Facebook page.

With Monday’s Adobe Digital Enterprise Platform and Customer Experience Solutions announcement and our related video interview with Adobe’s Rob Pinkerton in mind, we thought it timely to share another look at a recent, relevant conversation from our blog.

Last fall, we interviewed Adobe’s Steven Webster, senior director of Technology and Experience Innovation, to get his perspective on customer/citizen experience and Government. Take a look at the three-part interview below for Steven’s insights on the topic.

And if you haven’t, you might also be interested to check out two recent posts from our Alec Chalmers discussing customer and citizen experience (here and here).

As always, we’re interested in your thoughts and perspective. Let us know in comments or on Twitter @AdobeGov. And you can reach Steven on Twitter @swebsteratadobe.

In the meantime, enjoy a look back at this conversation: