FOSE- Part Deux

Another busy day at the FOSE trade show at the Washington Convention Center. I interviewed several business executives who focus on the government IT market for my Straight to the Point podcast series. I won't spill the beans now as we'll be releasing the video early next week, but here are some key takeaways:

• all three executives are adding headcount and resources to their federal, state and local government sales and marketing teams
• all three agree that the stimulus package will be flowing real dollars into state and local government coffers
• beyond stimulus, all agree that the Obama administration's new priorities will shift new and real resources into cybersecurity, electronic health records, the smart gird and green technology more generally
  
• two execs believe that there will be a pronounced relative shift in funding dollars away from the DOD/Intel world into the federal civilian agencies

Tomorrow is the final day of the show. I'll be working the show floor to meet as many companies as possible as well as heading over to the adjacent GOVSEC show.

Were you at the show? What did you think about it? Did you have any insightful conversations?

I Want My Health Care Easy

Imagine a time when you can log onto Facebook, click on your Doctor's profile, schedule a appointment for the next few days, fill out a quick form with a list of what's ailing you, happy in the knowledge that your medical information will be electronically transferred to his medical and office software for quick diagnosis and easy billing.

Facebook's easy to use, consumer friendly medical insurance app would monitor the Doctor's invoice, the insurance company's payments for any errors, while anonymous data about your condition, diagnosis and treatment would be sent to the CDC so it could monitor for pandemic flu and other diseases.

All of this would happen with a few clicks of the mouse.

Science fiction right?

Electronic health records (EHR) have been talked about forever and a day it seems. I remember sitting through a compelling presentation at the AeA four years ago about EHR. Microsoft and Google have SaaS offerings already up. Everyone agrees that EHR will be consumer friendly, increase reporting, preserve privacy, save Doctors money- so why doesn't happen?

Probably because the whole healthcare industry is so fractured, non-functional and distorted by haphazard government regulation that something this, well simple, has to wait until everything else wrong with healthcare gets fixed first.

How messed up is it? Here are five healthcare experts talking on a NYTimes blog with five different takes on healthcare reform. They each have an axe to grind but none of them seems to have a holistic solution.

What do you think? Even given that the President is setting aside $600B for health care reform, will it work? Can it work?

Health Care and Social Media

One of the most interesting areas where social media will make an impact is in the health care industry. Most people would readily admit the last two groups to adopt any technology are lawyers and doctors. Of the two, I think that the doctors, and the larger healthcare industry, will be much more rapid adopters of social media. Here is why:

- Government regulation: healthcare reform, medical process management, electronic health records are all trends that, for better or worse, are pushing technology and healthcare workers together. It's easier to adopt social media when you are already using a mobile device, PC or laptop to view professional development videos, process medicare forms, view/send patient records and run your hospital/HMO/personal office.

- Generational shift: as the Baby Boomers move into retirement, they will create openings in senior management for people who are comfortable using technology to communicate transparently with peers, co-workers, vendors and customers.

- Customer demand: patients have adopted social media with amazing rapidity. They are now used to communicating with their service providers in a community type environment where the corporation's voice is merely one among many. Smart companies have mastered this new viral, less controlled communications environment. Less nimble companies have fumbled this opportunity to recreate relationships on a stronger basis, and have suffered sales and market share effects. Organizations as diverse as insurance companies to hospitals to medical device companies to professional associations will have to master social media in order to communicate effectively with their stakeholders.

What do you think? Am I off base? I'd like to get your feedback. Leave a comment below or feel free to fill out a quick three question survey I running on the use of social media and the healthcare industry http://tinyurl.com/6fscao

There was a very interesting webinar this morning organized by Washington Technology magazine and featuring Ray Bjorkland of FedSources.

Here is couple of tidbits I found interesting:

• there will be fewer government opportunities over the next few years but those that exist will be bigger
• it is increasingly important to get on an IDIQ contract or get on an existing team
• pure A-76 contracts will be rare, but mostly used for small scale staff augmentation deals
• the impact of the 2008 election will be minimal until the 2009 budget due to the length of the government budgeting cycle (well....duh)
• eGov initiatives seem to have broad based bi-partisan support and won't see much change over the next few years
• IPv6 is not a high risk change for government, but poses a huge managerial and cultural challenge. Will the government develop and implement a viable plan for all the ancillary changes that need to be addressed? Still up the in air.
• there a strong resurgence of interest and budgets in health IT. Electronic health records are driving budget growth as well as funds to directly support warfighter and veterans
• there will be increasing collaboration among government agencies, ie IWIN with DOJ/DHS. However, in the end, most contracts of this sort tend to get driven by one or another of the agencies involved.