Jacob Kupietzky

expert panel

Healthcare mergers and acquisitions are often built around a compelling financial or strategic thesis: expand market reach, add capabilities, improve scale or create efficiencies. Yet the hardest part of the transaction frequently begins after the paperwork is signed, when two organizations must actually function as one.That issue often comes down to the way work actually happens. Employees develop workarounds. Physicians build relationships and routines that aren't captured in organizational charts. Technology systems accumulate custom configurations. Data acquires its own definitions and dependencies. Products evolve along separate roadmaps. Leaders develop different approaches to decision-making and accountability. None of these realities necessarily makes an acquisition unattractive, but failing to understand them can make integration far more difficult than anticipated.So what should healthcare leaders be looking for before they close the deal?The members of the Senior Executive Healthcare Think Tank—a curated group of experts in healthcare operations, technology, workforce strategy, medical devices, data, AI and clinical systems—offer perspectives that collectively challenge the traditional due diligence checklist. The following insights explore where hidden operational risks tend to surface and, more importantly, the questions leaders should be asking while there is still time to act on the answers.

expert panel

A healthcare organization can look healthy on paper right up until it doesn’t.The quarterly numbers may be on target. Patient satisfaction may still be holding steady. Revenue may look strong. But somewhere inside the organization, a different story may already be taking shape: Employees are calling out more often. Patients are missing appointments. Clinicians are finding workarounds. Claims are taking longer to resolve. Information is moving more slowly between systems. People who used to speak up have started keeping quiet.By the time those problems show up in the metrics most executives watch, the organization may already be responding to consequences rather than causes.Below, members of the Senior Executive Healthcare Think Tank—experts in healthcare transformation, workforce strategy, patient experience, technology, revenue cycle, medical devices, interoperability, AI and digital health—look beyond traditional financial and operational measures and identify the signals that can reveal emerging problems, offering healthcare leaders a closer look at what they can measure now to better understand where their organizations are headed next.