Yale New Haven Health System

Yale New Haven Health System (YNHHS) is a nonprofit health care system with headquarters in New Haven, Connecticut. It is Connecticut's largest health care system with 2,588 beds in hospitals throughout Connecticut as well as New York and Rhode Island.

Yale New Haven Health System recognized the strategic need to transform their facilities department to become more unified. They had recently merged hospital systems and wanted to align their business processes. They looked to longtime technology management partner, Enstoa, to help them through the technical and functional aspects of this journey. Enstoa focuses exclusively on accelerated digital transformation for the built environment, not only for capital construction management, but also maintenance operations and space management. The team at Enstoa surveys an organization’s business processes and technology to assess how they perform and identify opportunities to re-engineer processes and systems to optimize business operations. Enstoa will either implement new software or improve the use of existing software and architect integrations to ensure organizations get the most out of their enterprise data.

Goal:

A nonprofit healthcare system with more than 2,500 beds in hospitals throughout Connecticut, New York, and Rhode Island, Yale New Haven Health System needed to transform its facilities department to become more unified.

Challenge:

Implementing software integrations that could capture budget and the procurement cycle.

Solution:

e-Builder’s processes module integrated well with cost management, granting the ability to set cost controls and obtain approvals through process workflows.

Ongoing Benefits:

e-Builder continues to be the central platform bringing together data from diverse departments, including IT, clinical engineering, building engineering, housekeeping, and security.

“The ability to set cost controls and obtain approvals through process workflows gave us the transparency and accountability over project budgets that was absent prior to e-Builder.”

- Ann Monks, Facilities Project Manager at YNHHS

In 2018, YNHHS selected the e-Builder Enterprise software to enable YNHHS to manage its capital construction program better. Like most health care systems, YNHHS would have a major capital improvement program starting every 8-10 years with a few flagship programs, and a large chunk contributing to improvements of existing facilities.

In March 2018, Enstoa started working with e-Builder’s Professional Services team to implement the tool. The implementation would include two integrations: one with Yale New Haven Health System’s ERP system, Infor, and the other with their planning tool, Strata. The implementation was broken out into two phases. The first phase was to roll out Documents and Schedules. This phase gave YNHHS some time to get comfortable with the system while working on a new version of Infor before integrating. Phase two included Cost, Processes, Reports & Dashboards, and integrations. “We built a very robust integration that captures budget and the procurement cycle. The books between the Finance department and the books in e-Builder Enterprise are in sync,” says Matthias Ebinger, Sr. Director of Digital Solutions at Enstoa. “The integration was so helpful because everyone had to use e-Builder. If it’s there, then people are willing to engage with it. Once you cannot get a contract done outside of the software, you get there much quicker, and adoption goes up,” Mr. Ebinger adds.

“We built a very robust integration that captures budget and the procurement cycle. The books between the Finance department and the books in e-Builder Enterprise are in sync...”

- Matthias Ebinger, Sr. Director of Digital Solutions at Enstoa

The team at YNHHS appreciated the ability of the Processes module to integrate with Cost Management. “The ability to set cost controls and obtain approvals through process workflows gave us the transparency and accountability over project budgets that was absent prior to e-Builder,” says Ann Monks, Facilities Project Manager at YNHHS. YNHHS deals with Guaranteed Maximum Price (GMP) contracts, which are fairly complex contracts in which a main contractor manages subcontractors. It can be difficult for owners to find the right balance of control. e-Builder provided a great out-of-the-box framework for managing these types of contracts. “e-Builder already had the structure in place that we needed to align with industry best practices. This really demonstrated how much they value their customer’s feedback and are able to listen and adjust as the construction industry evolves,” adds Mrs. Monks.

The team at YNHHS utilizes stand-up reports for basic reporting. Enstoa specializes in deploying robust analytics solutions that integrate data across many enterprise systems. YNHHS asked Enstoa to conduct a facilities data merge which consisted of pulling data from e-Builder into a data mart, while using Microsoft Power BI and Enstoa’s solution, Starfish Projects, to present that data and make it accessible to both project managers and the management team. By using the e-Builder API, Enstoa was able to pull the data out easily. The team is also utilizing the Schedule module, which ties into Cashflow. In addition, they have put a comprehensive document management structure in place, including a Transmittal process for all of their Partners to submit documents into e-Builder.

“As consultants, we enjoyed using e-Builder because the capabilities fall in line with construction best practices. If e-Builder doesn’t do it, you probably shouldn’t be doing it.”

- Matthias Ebinger, Sr. Director of Digital Solutions at Enstoa

The success of the implementation and roll out was largely due to the collaboration between the teams at Enstoa, YNHHS, and e-Builder. Enstoa looked to e-Builder’s Professional Service team to help with the technical areas where the e-Builder software required custom items. When it came to more generic elements where e-Builder is extremely flexible such as the workflow configuration, Enstoa was able to apply it to the needs of YNHHS. “As consultants, we enjoyed using e-Builder because the capabilities fall in line with construction best practices. If e-Builder doesn’t do it, you probably shouldn’t be doing it,” says Mr. Ebinger. “The sweet spot is when you get a customer like YNHHS who is also flexible enough to adjust the processes to what e-Builder offers,” he adds.

Enstoa’s digital transformation expertise, combined with Yale New Haven Health System’s focus on modernization and technology, paid off. In 2020, YNHHS won the American Society for Health Care Engineering’s Excellence in Health Care Facility Management Award. This award recognizes individuals or facility management departments that implement new or innovative programs or processes to optimize the physical environment and improve patient care. YNHHS was highlighted for executing new CMMS, PMIS and space management tool implementations systemwide, building sophisticated integrations between existing systems, and performing large-scale data standardization while maintaining an unrelenting focus on improving both the customer experience and the team’s experience interacting with the data.

e-Builder continues to be the central platform that brings individuals from different departments together. Health care tends to have very cross-disciplinary teams including Information Technology, Clinical Engineering, Building Engineering, Housekeeping, Security, etc. e-Builder is bringing those teams and all the data together.

About Enstoa

Enstoa is a better way to build. We are the only company that maintains an exclusive focus on accelerated digital transformation for the built environment. Their clients are empowered to build and do more through advanced technology, decades’ worth of benchmarking data, industry-leading expertise, and evidence-based change management. Enstoa’s unrivaled blend of solutions and skills mean that even the most complex projects and portfolios can achieve true digital transformation and 360° visibility.
For more information, visit enstoa.com.

About e-Builder

e-Builder has more than 25 years of experience supporting owners like you in managing capital improvement projects.

e-Builder Enterprise automates information handoffs between designers, contractors, consultants and owners through a best-in-class workflow engine that transforms old paper processes to digital.

The best way to understand how e-Builder Enterprise can transform your capital program management is to see it for yourself.