Case studies

Innovative infrastructure for a growing health care network

Rochester Regional Health client spotlight

In 2014, two health care networks—Rochester General Health System (Rochester General) and Unity Health System (Unity)—merged to become Rochester Regional Health (Rochester Regional).

Migrating the best functionality to a new system

The merger incorporated five hospitals and many attendant services. To be successful, the new health care network needed its human resources (HR) department to streamline and optimize the combined staff, while avoiding disruptions.

To achieve those goals in a highly complex, interconnected network of highly specialized professionals, Rochester Regional needed more than just a reliable technology platform, it needed that platform to be implemented quickly and effectively. That's why it called on Deloitte to help implement Workday, which was essential to helping the newly combined HR department retain talent, streamline functionality, and establish a blueprint for future mergers and acquisitions challenges.

Before the merger, Rochester General and Unity had adopted new HR systems. The combined network needed to incorporate the best of both, and the HR team decided the Workday system, which Rochester General had implemented in 2014, was the product for the future.

"That decision turned on Workday's ability to provide technical upgrades—such as dashboards and mobile capabilities—that also addressed personnel challenges," says Jason Frank, Rochester Regional's senior director of human resources information systems. "The biggest differentiator of Workday is the business process framework, which is the underlying way you design business processes and how they work in terms of roles and assignments."

That framework, a cloud-based, multi-tenant, SaaS platform, is designed to exploit new synergies within the system and streamline many time-consuming functions. To get the most out of that system, Rochester Regional brought on Deloitte.

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To be credible as a strategic business partner, an HR function must have reliable data and use that data to navigate the gray areas that are often present in complex people issues.

—Janine Schue, Rochester Regional's chief human resources officer and executive vice president

Solving today's problems, anticipating tomorrow's challenges

To compete, Rochester Regional needs to bring in the best talent, and it expects that an HR system with fewer bottlenecks is a key part of that. In addition to optimizing the day-to-day of HR management, Workday is helping it pool talent and maintain its strategic, forward-thinking focus.

With further expansion plans in the works, Rochester Regional has an ongoing need to offer new services and optimize personnel placement. Workday deployment will help keep the right people near their job sites and maintain ongoing regulatory requirements, while reducing the time needed to complete new deployments. With Deloitte's help, Rochester's HR is converting hours previously devoted to system maintenance into ongoing innovation and growth.

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Where we had truly unique situations and needed to adapt certain practices, Deloitte helped us and enabled us to be faster and more precise in our deployment.

—Mazie Tai, Rochester Regional's vice president of HR operations

Impacts from transformation

  • Easier onboarding for new hires
  • Simplified and better visualized methods of regulatory compliance
  • Better succession planning for promotions and replacements
  • Clearer tracking of employees' certification licensing
  • Automated benefits administration, with faster enrollment and integration of files for vendors

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