Case Study: Flexible Managed Services Deliver Salesforce Success for Sound Physicians

The 4,000-plus colleagues of Tacoma-based Sound Physicians work with hospitals, health systems, nursing homes, and payers to Improve quality and reduce the cost of healthcare for patients in communities across the country. The physician-led organization partners with EightCloud to cost-effectively implement and evolve their critical technologies, from telemedicine to billing automation.

 

Background

With dynamic staffing needs, the Sound Physicians’ Salesforce development team is charged with making sure the company’s technology is up to the task. A big part of their effort in 2020 has been to improve back-end telemedicine operations.

The telemedicine infrastructure — as well as other Salesforce systems — requires complicated architectures as one physician could be assigned to multiple combinations of clinics, hospitals, or health plans at a time.

Business Challenge

Sound Physicians Needed a Salesforce Managed Services Partner

In 2018, Sound Physicians’ IT consolidated Salesforce technology development  transitioned to an agile development cycle. But staffing such an operation is expensive and company needs fluctuate.

Flexible expertise was needed.

As a result, Sound Physicians chose a fractional Full-Time Equivalent (FTE) model. For about the price of one FTE, the company engaged with EightCloud for multiple architects, administrators and specialists.

What We Did

Salesforce Expertise on Tap

Now, Sound Physicians opts for a mixed-resource model, relying on the company as a regular member of the scrum team and tapping specialized expertise when needed.

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If we didn’t have EightCloud, the velocity of our projects would be much lower. Plus, it’s difficult to hire good people with the expertise we need for our systems, especially since many of them are narrow in scope. Because we have this relationship, we don’t have to go down that path of finding our own Salesforce experts.”

– Krista Adams, Salesforce Administrator and Scrum Master
Sound Physicians

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It started small: With a dedicated person, using about 20% of Salesforce’s functionality, on small projects. As larger programs were implemented, Sound Physicians relied more on specialized products, such as Conga.

Due to the built-in flexibility, the client can expand, retract or change course as needed.
EightCloud has already altered delivery models due to changing environments.

Key projects completed by EightCloud

1.  Clinical pay automation
2. Candidate privileging
3. Enhanced visibility into recruiting
4. Conga and DocuSign integration
5. Enhanced architecture for Telemedicine programs  

 

Results

Massive Projects Under Budget

Another important project: Clinical pay automation. The billing system was a huge undertaking and involved nearly two years of data migration from payroll. The project also included advanced automation.

Some other milestones include:

1. More than 75 two-week sprints.

2. A two-year roadmap.

3. Projects for the past year have been under budget.

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What I really enjoy about EightCloud is the ability to collaborate with them. We utilize them for their expertise and experiences with similar projects they’ve had with other clients. They’ve always been great team players.”

– Krista Adams, Salesforce Administrator and Scrum Master,
Sound Physicians

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