Why Healthcare Financial Planning & Analysis (FP&A) Software Is Critical for Your Organization

While financial management can be a hurdle for businesses across all sectors, it is particularly challenging for organizations operating in the healthcare sector. Fortunately, healthcare FP&A software solutions can help your organization overcome these threats to business continuity and streamline key fiscal processes.

However, it is vital that you carefully research multiple FP&A software options before making your selection. The tools, capabilities, and features that each solution contains will vary. By vetting each prospective solution, you can find the best financial planning software for your healthcare organization’s unique needs.

In order to help you navigate the FP&A software market for your healthcare organization, we have created this guide. Below, we recap what financial planning & analysis software is, outline what benefits it provides to the healthcare industry, and explore how you can leverage this innovative tech.

What Is Financial Planning & Analysis Software?

Financial planning & analysis (FP&A) software is purpose-built technology designed to help healthcare organizations like yours manage key fiscal concerns. While the exact scope of each healthcare financial planning solution will vary, top-end software can assist with tasks such as:

• General financial planning
• Budgeting
• Billing
• Accounting
• Forecasting
• Patient management

All of the tasks mentioned above can be serious threats to the business continuity of healthcare organizations if not managed properly. Financial planning software can help you tackle these challenges by providing access to all of this information via a single interface. 

Additionally, a financial planning solution for a healthcare org will increase overall organizational transparency and streamline the financial management process. It can even allow you to improve performance management by providing you access to advanced analytics and modeling tools.

Healthcare FP&A Software Is Critical to Your Healthcare Organization

As you know, the healthcare sector has become extremely competitive. Many organizations are vying for patients, which can make it difficult for you to capture a healthy market share. Many confounding factors have negatively impacted healthcare revenue streams over the last few years.

While overcoming the challenges facing modern healthcare organizations will require you to take a multifaceted approach, FP&A software will lay the foundation for smarter fiscal management. 

It will allow you to implement essential financial planning steps, such as those recommended by CMS. This technology offers a wide range of benefits for your organization, including the following:

Improved Transparency

Financial planning & analysis software in a healthcare company can significantly improve transparency throughout an organization. 

It provides fiscal personnel with a user-friendly interface through which operators can access important financial data. Other authorized users, such as stakeholders and organizational decision-makers, can also access this information.

Better Financial Performance

Historically, healthcare organizations have relied on revenue cycle management (“RCM”) software to address fiscal challenges. 

However, many of these antiquated solutions cannot effectively address the challenges facing modern healthcare organizations. The most notable of these challenges is the rising percentage of patients who fail to completely pay their medical bills.

The best financial planning & analysis software can help healthcare organizations gain the real-time insights and analytics needed to increase retention, boost supply chain resilience, and deliver quality patient post-care. In turn, this will increase the likelihood of obtaining funds for the services that your organization provides.

Enhanced Agility and Resilience

Ultimately, financial planning and analysis software can improve organizational agility. 

Appropriate technologies can stabilize revenue streams, decrease billing delays, and improve organizational resilience as well. These benefits will help your healthcare organization weather unexpected fiscal challenges more effectively while also preserving business continuity.

If the events of the last few years have demonstrated anything, it is that businesses must optimize agility. Those that do will be better prepared in the event of another large-scale incident such as the global pandemic. 

Conversely, businesses that fail to prepare may struggle to sustain normal operations when facing prolonged fiscal distress.  

What Are the Top Features to Look for in Financial Planning & Analysis Software for Your Healthcare Organization?

As you can see, healthcare FP&A software offers a multitude of benefits. However, it is vital that you select the best if you want to reap these advantages. To help you accomplish this, we have identified a few top features to look for in financial planning & analysis software for your healthcare company:

Automation

Automation capabilities are by far one of the most important tools to look for when selecting financial planning software for a healthcare org. As the name suggests, automation tools allow you to automate redundant or time-consuming tasks. 

FP&A software can automatically update system data with information from integrated programs and applications. This approach will ensure that all forecasting and budgeting calculations are accurate.

Automation tools not only enhance the accuracy of forecasting and budgeting, but they can also reduce the workload on your team. This automation will free them up to engage in more dynamic tasks. 

Reducing their workload can also lead to improved morale and higher productivity. This improvement is just one example of the trickle-down benefits associated with adopting these processes and software.

Agility

The best financial planning software will also be both agile and adaptable to the unique needs of your organization. One example of this is the ability to integrate with existing systems and applications. Solutions that can be easily integrated into your network will provide a faster return on investment and be less strenuous to implement. 

It will also enhance organizational agility by facilitating better collaboration between various departments or teams. Front office personnel, back-office staff, fiscal management professionals, and others can effortlessly share information. This integration will reduce the frequency of miscommunications and improve fiscal planning capabilities.  

User-Friendly Functionality

It does not matter how feature-laden a financial planning & analysis software platform is if it is tedious to use. You must ensure that your software provides a high-quality user experience. By selecting software that is easy to use, you can improve the adoption of the new technology.

There are several ways to gauge the user-friendliness of software. One approach is to read head-to-head reviews, such as this piece comparing Workday vs. Anaplan. Additionally, you can contact healthcare FP&A software providers and inquire about scheduling a demo.

Customizability

The best financial planning software offers lots of customization options. Examples include customizable dashboards, integration opportunities, and reporting configurations. Customizable software can be tailored to the needs and challenges of your organization.

While rigid solutions may improve your financial planning capabilities, they do not offer the flexibility to evolve with your organization. That is why you should examine a product’s customizability before selecting software.

How to Choose the Right Software for You

There are several tactics that you can use when exploring financial planning & analysis software solutions for your health or medical organization. A few such tactics include the following:

Identify Your Biggest Challenges

Before you read the first review or book a demo, you must first identify the biggest challenges facing your organization. Is your organization uncertain about the future due to inaccurate forecasting tools? Do you need to improve collection rates to stabilize revenue streams?

By answering these key questions, you will be better positioned to select the right software for your organization. You can also pose these questions to software providers when vetting products. Ask them how their product can improve your revenue stream or inquire about the accuracy of their analytics tools.

Determine Which Features Are Top Priorities

While all of the top healthcare financial planning software solutions will include a suite of powerful tools and capabilities, many options out there offer niche features as well. Therefore, it is important to determine which tools are considered “must-have” items for your organization.

For example, let’s say your organization is in the midst of a hyper-automation initiative. In this scenario, you should focus on products that offer top-end machine learning and artificial intelligence tools.

Check Out Software Review Sites

There are numerous software review sites that outline the capabilities of various technology solutions. Quite a few of these sites provide free reviews and pricing estimates on financial planning software as well. A few prime examples include Software Suggest and G2.

Since some review sites receive funding or are otherwise influenced by technology companies, it is best to check out multiple sources. If a product receives consistently high ratings across multiple sites, then it is likely a top option.

How to Get Started and Maximize the Results with Your New Software

Financial planning and analysis software can be a valuable asset to your organization. However, you must carefully plan out the implementation process if you want to maximize your results and obtain a strong return on investment. While there are several ways to approach this challenge, we recommend that you follow these steps:

Choose Your Software

Naturally, the first step to getting started is selecting your software. Remember, scheduling a demo and communicating with developers are great ways to find the right planning and analysis stack for you.

During the vetting process, also examine pricing to ensure that the software aligns with your budgetary constraints. This approach will help you prevent wasting time by demoing a product, only to find out that it is too cost-prohibitive to implement.

Find an Integration Partner

Even if you have an experienced IT staff on payroll, integrating healthcare financial planning software into your network can be a monumental task. 

You should consider outsourcing part or all of this task to a third-party integrations firm. Such a firm can provide you with much-needed resources to expedite the integration process.

The sooner you can integrate the solution into your network, the faster you can begin leveraging it to enhance financial management.  

Train Your Staff

You should begin training your staff on the technology during the integration process. The developer will likely be able to provide you with well-designed training resources so that you do not have to create your own materials. These resources may include interactive modules, slide show presentations, or explainer videos. 

Starting employee training early can improve buy-in and produce a positive ROI sooner.

Go Live

The final step is to go live. A great provider will offer ongoing support during this process, as any large-scale integration is bound to involve a few surprises.

After you start using your new software, make sure to review its efficacy on a monthly basis. This review will help you identify additional ways to incorporate the platform into your financial planning processes. In turn, this will further enhance your ROI.

Taking Advantage of Financial Planning & Analysis Software In The Healthcare Space

FP&A software is exactly what your healthcare organization needs to improve forecasting, enhance budgetary management procedures, and protect business continuity. However, we understand that selecting the best financial planning software can be challenging due to the abundance of options out there.

If you would like help navigating this process or would like to explore our product, Workday Adaptive Planning, connect with Qbix Analytics today. This Workday integrations guide highlights the versatility of our solution. You can schedule a meeting or provide us with contact information via this page.

Want to Learn More?

Is your healthcare organization looking to improve its budgeting process? Join the QBIX Team and some of our healthcare customers on Thursday, October 27, 2022, at 10:00 am PST in a discussion to learn more about what Workday Adaptive Planning can do in your organization. Topics include personal modeling, OPEX modeling, and reporting.

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Further Reading

• Financial Planning Software: A 2021 Guide
• CaptivateIQ Integrations Guide: Features & Benefits Explained
• It’s Time to Improve your Sales Commission Plan
• The Pulse of Financial Planning (Sept. 3, 2020)
• Understanding Enterprise Performance Management (EPM)