Earlier this month, I led a virtual roundtable with leaders from three top health systems and a group of 15 Initialized healthcare founders to explore how to strengthen relationships with this critical customer segment. Especially in the current macro environment, closing sales is critical and working with health systems can be tricky to navigate.

Leaders from diverse institutions such as UCLA, Cedars Sinai and Mayo Clinic generously shared their expertise on partnering with startups with the group. 

Specifically, special thanks to Manu Nair, chair and head of partnerships at Mayo Clinic; Vladimir Manuel, medical director at UCLA Health and Maureen Burgess, partner at Cedars Sinai Health Ventures for spending time with our healthcare founders.

Below are five takeaways from the session:

1) Targeting partners won’t work without first identifying their priorities and goals.

Goals can vary tremendously between institutions. While one system may prioritize operational improvements through flow solutions, another institution may be seeking co-development opportunities to increase their IP, and another may be research focused. Understanding these differing goals is key for founders, who may be seeking investment, customers, or academic partnership.  

2) Identify your impact measures and understand you will be evaluated. 

Likewise the criteria for evaluating new partnerships can be dramatically different ranging from the automation of clinical and administrative processes to optimizing patient care delivery. There is no shortcut to conversations with health system leaders to understand their priorities.

3) Founders need a plan to navigate organizational structures and get to a decision. 

Maureen Burgess of Cedars Sinai advised, “They need to find out whose budget your solution impacts and involve them early. Also, introduce your solution in a way that includes operational stakeholders, financial, or website personnel, and IT or EIS folks to discuss integration into workflows.”

4)  You can’t just identify a champion, you need to support them in making a case for ROI. 

Dr. Vlad Manuel of UCLA guided founders to start by identifying fit and beyond that to “demonstrate how your product solves a direct problem or improves the system significantly to accelerate acceptance and integration.”

5) Hospitals are not risk takers when it comes to implementing AI. 

Evaluating AI and other advanced technologies involves balancing risk assessment with the proactive value these technologies may offer. Many systems ask for clinical validation through studies and examples of successful implementations before committing to something new. They are trying to understand and validate how these solutions fit into their operations and positively impact patient care.