Healthcare Contract Management Implementation Timeline

Contract Management Implementation

Healthcare Contract Management Implementation

Contract management software deployments and implementations can vary in complexity based on your organization's needs, as well as the decision to deploy via the cloud or on-premise.

A new page has been developed for the Contract Guardian Website.  The example walks through the steps/timeline of a healthcare contract management implementation and deployment.

Healthcare Contract Management Implementation

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Learn more about Contract Guardian by calling 513.977.4544 or request a demonstration

Contract Guardian Releases Autoreviewer Module

Contract Guardian Autoreviewer Module

Cincinnati, OH - August 27, 2015 - Contract Guardian (solution from Rippe & Kingston Systems, Inc.) today announced it has automated the process of proofreading your contact with the release of the Autoreviewer Module.

Very few Enterprise Contract Management Systems offer this exciting capability.  Imagine having someone available to proofread your contracts every time there is a new document added or a new version of the document.  Contract Guardian does exactly that and can stop a contract in its tracks and alert you regarding inappropriate phrase or potential risk.

New module is provided to all clients at no additional charge!

See complete Press Release.

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Learn more about Contract Guardian by calling 513.977.4544 or request a demonstration

Contract Guardian Release Graphical Workflow Manager

Contract Guardian Release Graphical Workflow Manager 

Cincinnati, OH - July 24, 2015 - Contract Guardian (solution from Rippe & Kingston Systems, Inc.) today announced it has released Contract Guardian Workflow Management,which manages contract approvals, reviews and other processes from within Contract Guardian. Through this advanced workflow capability, contract managers, compliance officers and other business leaders can automate the tedious, and often manual, approval and reviews processes required to push forward critical contracts, projects and initiatives.

Read complete press release.

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Learn more about Contract Guardian by calling 513.977.4544 or request a demonstration

New Release of Version Control for Contract Guardian

Contract Guardian leapfrogs the competition with it's latest release of Version Control. 

Cincinnati, OH - June 22, 2015 - Contract Guardian (solution from Rippe & Kingston Systems, Inc.) today announced it has released Contract Guardian Version Control.  Most Enterprise Contract Management Systems offer version control.  However, it is typically limited to the contract.  The development team decided this was not adequate.  As part of the role out of Contract Management Workflow, we decided that version control should be applicable to every contract and all attachments.  In addition, it must be both automatic and intuitive for the user.  That was the genesis of the New Contract Management Version Control.

Read complete press release.

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Learn more about Contract Guardian by calling 513.977.4544 or request a demonstration

Contract Guardian Releases Power Grid

Contract Guardian Power Grid

Cincinnati, OH - May 27, 2015 - Contract Guardian (solution from Rippe & Kingston Systems, Inc.) today announced it has released Contract Guardian Power Grid.

Ever wish you could edit records right within a report view of Contract Guardian? Contract Guardian Power Grid enables user to consolidate their editing process by selecting the records and fields they wish to edit without having to open each individual record. Inline editing makes it fast and easy to edit contract / document records without ever having to navigate away from the Contract Guardian Power Grid.

Mass Edit with Rich Interface

• Advanced filtering on all data fields - dynamically changes based on field type and allowable options
• Configurable view lets users see record details without opening the record itself
• Sorting on any column by clicking on column heading
• Drag and drop layout to put the information in the sequence you desire

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Learn more about Contract Guardian by calling 513.977.4544 or request a demonstration

Anchorage Community Mental Health Services Selects Contract Guardian

Anchorage Community Mental Health Services Selects Contract Guardian 

Contract Management from Any Device

Cincinnati, OH - March 3, 2015 - Contract Guardian, a leading solution for managing company contracts, commitments, and compliance announced that Anchorage Community Mental Health Services, Inc. has selected and deployed Contract Guardian into their environment.  In addition to numerous types of contracts, they are also managing a significant number of Grants.

They are leveraging Contract Guardian to simplify and update all aspects of healthcare contract management and compliance within their organization. The hospital will utilize the Cloud Based version of Contract Guardian over the web, thus requiring no capital expenditure. All aspects of a hospital's contract management lifecycle, including contract creation, monitoring of key milestones, and compliance can be managed via a computer or any popular mobile device. Contract Guardian offers Contract Data Conversion as part of the overall service offering for organizations migrating from their existing solution.

"We are always excited to add a new client.  This is our first hospital in Alaska and we are pleased that Anchorage Community Mental Health Services, Inc. selected Contract Guardian," said, John Reuter, Director of Implementation Services of Contract Guardian.

Anchorage Community Mental Health Services, Inc.

About Anchorage Community Mental Health Services, Inc. (ACMHS) has been the largest community mental health provider in the state of Alaska since 1974. Their mission is to promote recovery and wellness by providing consumer-driven behavioral health care services to the people of Anchorage and surrounding area. Consumer driven means their consumers are choosing their own healthcare and the path to the road to recovery. They serve children who are severely emotionally disturbed, adults with severe mental illness and individuals with Alzheimer's disease or related dementia. Every day there are stories of children and adults getting better and overcoming the impact of mental illness on their lives.

About Contract Guardian (a Rippe & Kingston Systems, Inc. Solution) Rippe & Kingston Systems, Inc. has clients in 44 States (With the recent addition of Alaska) and 9 Countries. Our Contract Guardian contract management software has been a key part of our overall success. Hospitals and healthcare were the first clients to leverage this powerful product and then it spread to other industries. Some of the comments the clients share with us:

• Dramatic reduction in the time and effort to manage contracts
• Unlimited contract types and user defined fields assure us that we can address any contract today and in the future
• The searching, reporting, filtering and overall access of all data and related documents is simply amazing
• Access from anywhere, anytime and almost any device including Windows/Mac, Tablets and Smartphone's means we always have immediate access
• Security was critical to our decision

The Contract Guardian development standards facilitate:

• Rapid enhancement for Contract Management Features
• Built-in trusted security that is required for any cloud solution
• Industry standard code that eases the minds of your Information Technology department
• Ease of Integration via Web Services
• Design flexibility to meet the client needs

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Learn more about Contract Guardian by calling 513.977.4544 or request a demonstration

Contract Management - A Little Bit Easier

Contract Management - A Little Bit Easier

There are numerous ways that the best of breed contract management software aids in the simplification and automation of the contract management process.  Among them are:

• Creation of unique contract types
• Work Flow Assignments
• Electronic Signature
• Instantaneous Searching
• Reporting
• Comprehensive Security Structure

However, one of the most underappreciated ways a Contract Management System can simplify the process is by what it shows the user.  For example, top tier contract management systems allow you to create unique contract types with unique data requirements appearing on the screen.  In Contract Guardian we offer those feature and more.  Once example is the configuration of system fields.

Slide to yes or no and Contract Guardian will control if the system field is required for that type of contract.

User Defined Fields that are associated with a group of fields are called a fieldset.  This enables the creation of a wide range of field types such as

• Auto increment
• Check box
• Date
• Email
• MultiPicker
• Numeric
• Paragraph
• Phone Number
• Single Picker
• Text
• URL - web address

With each one of these fields, the client can define the type, value options, default values, required or not and status of the field.  When these fields are added to a fieldset, they can use the drag and drop feature to organize the fields to appear on the screen in the sequence they desire.  This makes it easier for the user to complete the information since it is sequence appropriately, default values are already defined and it will confirm any required data.

A user can define a contract type that includes a group of these fieldsets.  Again, the user can use the drag and drop to put the groups of fields in exactly the sequence they want them to appear on the screen.  Everything appears exactly the way the user of a specific contract would expect the data to appear.  Any contract type can be changed after the fact if they wish to add a new data element, remove one from appearing or change the sequence.

We have recently expanded the control of the screen real estate to include the toggling of data appearing for a user at any point in time.

BEFORE

AFTER

So as you can see, by showing the user only what they need/want  and in the sequence desired, the contract process becomes a little bit easier and more intuitive.

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Learn more about Contract Guardian by calling 513.977.4544 or request a demonstration

Contract Guardian Featured at Technology Conference in New Orleans

Contract Guardian Featured at International Technology Conference in New Orleans

Cincinnati, OH - October 6, 2014 - Contract Guardian was thrilled with the opportunity and selection as the only Contract Management Software Offering to participate in this International Technology Conference provided by BlueStar.

Integration with ProspectStream, management of any document/contract type and DocuSign esignature and work flow were demonstrated at the booth.

Other major exhibitors included names like HP, Honeywell, Motorola, Zebra Technologies, Epson, Datalogic and 3M..

The VARTECH conference provided by BlueStar is a world class venue, designed to foster the collaboration between technology partners and unite the industry with their Value-Added Resellers and BlueStar team.  The conference included educational workshops, solutions sessions and hands on demonstration.  Contract Guardian was in the CodeZone Exhibitg Hall.  It was exciting to be included with some of the leading vendors in the world offering technological solutions for healthcare, manufacturing, logistics, point of sale, government, RFID and security.

The 1,700 attendees also had ample opportunity to enjoy Bourbon Street and a visit to the Super Dome.

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Learn more about Contract Guardian by calling 513.977.4544 or request a demonstration

Rapid Scan Module Released for Contract Guardian

Contract & Document Scanning Optimized for the Web!

Cincinnati, OH - September 12, 2014 - Contract Guardian (solution from Rippe & Kingston Systems, Inc.) today announced it has released a new module call "Rapid Scan".   Based on Dynamsoft's Dynamic Web TWAIN SDK,  Contract Guardian Rapid Scan Enables Web-Based Contract and Document Scanning, Archival and Retrieval which is ideal for industries like Healthcare, Legal, Government, Finance, etc.

Below is a screenshot from the user interface:

Read Press Release

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Learn more about Contract Guardian by calling 513.977.4544 or request a demonstration

Related articles

• Dynamsoft Adds OCR for Its Document Processing Tool

Contract Guardian Certified by DocuSign for e-Signature

Contract Guardian Integrates DocusSign Electronic Signature

Cincinnati, OH - July 15, 2014 - Contract Guardian, a leading solution for managing company contracts, commitments, and compliance is pleased to announce the native integration of DocuSign, the world's leading e-signature solution, into our web-based Contract Management application.

"We are pleased to provide this valuable electronic signature service to Contract Guardian clients via native integration with DocuSign." Contract Guardian Services Team, Rippe & Kingston Systems, Inc.

The DocuSign electronic signature platform supports auditable electronic signatures that can be embedded in existing documents and accessed and signed via a Web browser. Features include: 

• e-Signature compliance 
• Automated reminders, expiration, and authentication 
• Workflow, routing, and audit trail capabilities 
• Fully integrated with Contract Guardian

Read Press Release

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Learn more about Contract Guardian by calling 513.977.4544 or request a demonstration

Contract Guardian Will Exhibit at HCCA Conference in Indianapolis, IN

Contract Guardian Plans Exhibition in Indianapolis, IN

Contract Guardian, a leading solution for managing company contracts, commitments, and compliance announced that its plans to attend the HCCA North Central Regional Conference in Indianapolis, IN on October 6th, 2014.  The event will be held at the Indianapolis Marriott North.

Topics being covered during this regional conference include: ICD-10, Meaningful Use, Auditing and Monitoring Appropriate Access by Workforce Members, Stark/Anti-kickback, Cloning and Correction of Medical Records and Conducting a Compliance Audit / Review.

"We are always excited to both attend and sponsor the great HCCA events," said, John Reuter, Director of Implementation Services of Contract Guardian.

 Read More

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Learn more about Contract Guardian by calling 513.977.4544 or request a demonstration

Contract Guardian To Attend HCCA Mid Central Regional Compliance Conference in Louisiville

Contract Guardian Plans Exhibition in Louisville, KY

Contract Guardian, a leading solution for managing company contracts, commitments, and compliance announced that its plans to attend the HCCA Mid Central Regional Conference in Louisville, KY on November 7, 2014.  The event will be held at the Marriott Louisville East on 11/7/2014.

Topics being covered during this regional conference include: Top 10 Security Concerns for Healthcare IT, Federal & State Criminal Healthcare Fraud Investigations, Security, The London CIA, OIG Update, Show ME the Money, and Round Table Discussion - Hospital/Privacy & Security/Compliance Hot Topics.

"We are always excited to attend one of the many great HCCA events and meet with regional leaders in the healthcare industry.  I am particularly excited about the focus on IT and Security," said, John Reuter, Director of Implementation Services of Contract Guardian. Read More

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Learn more about Contract Guardian by calling 513.977.4544 or request a demonstration

Non-Profit Acute Care Hospital Goes Live with Contract Guardian

On July 15, 2014

California Based Hospital to Deploy Gold Cloud Edition of Contract Guardian

Cincinnati, OH - July 15, 2014 - Contract Guardian, a leading solution for managing company contracts, commitments, and compliance announced that a leading non-profit acute care hospital in California has gone live with Contract Guardian the 'Intuitive Contract Management' solution, to effectively manage contracts, improve visibility, manage access, and evaluate performance.

The hospital is leveraging Contract Guardian to simplify and update all aspects of healthcare contract management and compliance within their organization. The hospital will utilize the Cloud Based version of Contract Guardian over the web, thus requiring no capital expenditure. All aspects of a hospital's contract management lifecycle, including contract creation, monitoring of key milestones, and compliance can be managed via a computer or any popular mobile device. Contract Guardian offers Contract Data Conversion as part of the overall service offering for organizations migrating from their existing solution. Read More

Healthcare Contract Management and the Impact of Hospital Mergers

Mergers in Healthcare are becoming very common.  Healthcare consolidation has been on the rise lately with little sign of slowing down. The industry's merger and acquisition activity increased by almost 20 percent in the third quarter of 2013 compared with the same quarter a year ago, with 267 deals announced in the past three months, according to Irving Levin Associates. (Source: Becker’s Hospital Review)

While a merger can make great financial sense, it often results in a loss of institutional memory that walks away with the reduction in staff.  A merger may also result in some promotions of existing contract managers and promote them.  Again, an organization can experience loss of knowledge and expertise.

One way to mitigate pain and loss in the transition is the effective use of a strong healthcare contract management system.   Our experience tells us that having the following components will make the transition rewarding and retention of the hospital contract management knowledge successful:

• Well defined healthcare contract management contract types.  Each type should clearly specify the unique data to be captured, what is required, optional and default values.
• Strong journal of all transactions and the history of any change, comment and notification regarding an agreement.
• Defined alert system as well as a work flow and signing approval  for each contract type.
• Ability to transfer “in mass” responsibility of a group of contracts from one person to another.  (Note:  one should perform a check on all alerts to identify any email addresses that are no longer valid due to reduction/change in staff or change to email addresses)
• Reporting system to review, report and identify any potential concerns.
• If you have a hosted contract management system (sometimes called SaaS or Cloud), you will eliminate one of the many challenges that the IT team often faces.

You will still experience pain with almost any merger or acquisition.  However, having the above in place for your contract management system will minimize the loss and ease the transition.

Learn more about Contract Guardian by calling 513.977.4544 or request a demo

Related articles

• Why Medical Practice Mergers Fail (or Fail to Get Off the Ground)
• $3.8B Beaumont, Botsford, Oakwood merger a done deal following hospital boards' approval

How Do You Manage Your Business Agreements

If you're like many companies, you keep a growing list of hard copies and electronic files plus a nifty spreadsheet to track key dates and details. Yet it can still take hours, even days, to track down the data you need when you need it.

Not having an effective system to manage your contracts is almost as bad as not having a contract! Organizations have invested significant time and money to reach the point of a signed contract. Unfortunately, it is incorrectly believed that this is the last time anyone needs to look at the agreement.

Explore how a Contract Management System Addresses your Needs.  Read Complete Article by Thom Davidson

How to Preserve Institutional Knowledge with Contract Management Software

I read a blog posting with the title “How to Preserve Institutional Knowledge” by Ron Askenas.  He has some excellent points that are definitely worth sharing.

• The core knowledge of an institution often leaves when individuals are promoted, transferred or depart
• Knowledge disappears even more rapidly when a firm reorganizes or merges with another (We have seen this occur with our healthcare contract management clients)

He suggests that there are a couple of ways to overcome loss of institutional knowledge:

• First, build an explicit strategy for maintaining institutional memory, even in your own team. Don’t assume that it will happen by itself.
• Second, as part of your strategy, identify the few key things that you want every member of your team to know or be able to do — and figure out how to turn this from an implicit assumption to an explicit expectation.
• Finally, use technology to create a process by which your team continually captures and curates institutional knowledge

I had a little epiphany when I realized Contract Guardian Contract Management delivers the capability for capturing the Institutional Knowledge of any organization.  As a result I have written some examples of how to leverage Contract Guardian to satisfy this pressing need.  Read Complete Article.

Learn more about Contract Guardian by calling 513.977.4544 or request a demo

Press Release | June 2014 - Contract Guardian Releases Enterprise Search API

New Contract Guardian Search API

Contract Guardian can be integrated with almost any existing system to further extend the power and level of unification of various systems.  "The API is easy to use and yet powerful!" - Thom Davidson

The search API can be initiated with or without predefined parameters.  Typically, clients will have an icon that will initiate the search.  It will open a new window and execute the full text search.  The search addresses all security concerns and constraints associated with the client / user.

Read Complete Release

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Learn more about Contract Guardian by calling 513.977.4544 or request a demonstration.

Contract Management Conversion Tip with Contract Guardian

Contract Management Conversion Tip with Contract Guardian

Notifications via email is certainly the default approach for most contract management systems.  However, it is not very effective if the email is undeliverable.  On a day to day basis, Contract Guardian automatically monitors delivery, bounces, click through, etc.  Obviously, those checks are performed after the delivery attempt is made.

Here is a proactive tip that can be incorporated into one of your conversion steps and annual house cleaning chores for contract management.  I will use a healthcare contract management environment for my example:

Steps

1. One time step: Create email notification in Contract Guardian that is sent to all parties in the system.  This will include internal hospital employees as well outside vendors, etc.  Identify the email as a test and tell the recipient no action is required.
2. One time step: Create agreement.  Link all parties in the system to the agreement.  Select only the email notification that was created in step 1.  Define the agreement as auto renewal with an increment of 1 year per renewal.  Trigger the notification 1 day prior to expiration.
3. Automatic: Contract Guardian will automatically monitor for any undeliverable "hard bounce" emails that indicate  that either the hospital / vendor employee is no longer with the organization or it was entered incorrectly. 
4. Annual: Make your corrections/additions/deletions and Contract Guardian is set to automatically do your annual checkup going forward..

Example of Rejected Emails

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About Contract Guardian

Contract Guardian – Contract Management software has been a key part of our overall success. Hospitals and healthcare were the first clients to leverage this powerful product and then it spread to other industries (Finance, Technology, Legal, Government, Manufacturing, etc.)

Contract Guardian – Contract Management has established an exceptional reputation for client service and quality of solution.  Client satisfaction is fundamental to Contract Guardian and is our top priority.

Learn more about Contract Guardian by calling 513.977.4544 or request a demo.

Contract Management – What to do next?

Contract Management - What to do next?

Contracts and their associated tasks change constantly. How do contract managers know what to do next? The Contract Guardian solution offers easy-to-use ways to manage, track, remind and notify you at every turn in the life-cycle of a contract.

Contract Management Dashboard

The first place is on the Contract Guardian dashboard that is configured specifically to the user profile.  As a contract manager, several important information streams are immediately available:

• Announcements – This is both internal and external contract management update announcements
• Contract Journal Feed – You will see a stream of the most recent activities where you have responsibility.
• Recent Contracts – The five (5) most recent contracts that you have visited are shown with an immediate link to the agreement.
• Upcoming Contract Deadlines – Seeing a graphical representation of deadlines for the next 6 months can be very informative.  Example: A hospital contract manager might see the upcoming physician employee agreement renewals for which they are responsible.
• Contract Profile Chart – All of the contract types are summarized into a pie chart with the number of each type being displayed.

Contract Guardian Primary Contracts Tab

Contract Managers usually spend a majority of their day on the main page.  Here is where they can filter, search, sort and organize all of their agreements.  One quick and easy tool to keep you up to speed is your favorites.  Simply click on the star next to any agreement and it will become one of your favorites.  Now, a punch list of work is available without even searching.

Contract Notifications

Contract Notifications – Contract Guardian has some of the most comprehensive capabilities in the contract management industry.

• Unlimited Email notifications with mail merge capabilities triggered by  core and user defined fields
• Task email notifications
• Work Flow assignments & notifications
• Delivery monitoring of contract email alerts – read article Contract Management Software – After the Email Alerts

Documents with Tasks

Documents with Tasks Tab shows you all of the contracts that have outstanding tasks.  Click on the task(s) associated with the agreement and you will see all of the details.  Not sure which contract has an outstanding task, simply click on the tab for Documents with Task.  One can sort and filter the task by fields such as due date, assigned to, task type, title, etc. read article Contract Management Software – After the Email Alerts

My Tasks

My Tasks – Provides a detailed breakdown of tasks that are specifically for you.  You can see the unique grid views that divided into Outstanding, Closed and a Calendar View. You can also create a new task from here as well.  (A task email can optionally be sent upon creation) 

Contract Task Tab

Contract Task Tab –This pull out tab is accessed from any page in the system.  It will pull out and you can see any of your tasks.  In addition, you can select and close the tasks directly from the tab as well access complete task management.  

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About Contract Guardian

Contract Guardian – Contract Management software has been a key part of our overall success. Hospitals and healthcare were the first clients to leverage this powerful product and then it spread to other industries (Finance, Technology, Legal, Government, Manufacturing, etc.)

Contract Guardian – Contract Management has established an exceptional reputation for client service and quality of solution.  Client satisfaction is fundamental to Contract Guardian and is our top priority.

Learn more about Contract Guardian by calling 513.977.4544 or request a demo.

Contract Guardian Search Receives Inter-Face Lift

Search Wikiquote (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Face-Lift for Search in Contract Guardian

The Inter-Face Lift (excuse the pun) change is in the delivery of the results.  The contract management search module in Contract Guardian now delivers the most effective results in addition to its reputation for arguably the best and certainly fastest search engine in the contract management industry.

Meta Data of Contract

Every search that has a hit on the Meta data of a contract delivers the following:

• Name of contract
• Link to the contract meta data and attachments
• Type of agreement
• Organization 
• Status of contract
• Name of the field(s) where the content matches.  It also highlights in yellow the search argument.
• Date contract was created
• Who (user) that created the agreement
• Date contract was modified
• Who (user) that last modified the agreement

Actual Contract and Attachments (PDF, Word, Excel, etc.)

Every search that has a hit on the content of the contract (primary attachment) and other attachments delivers the following:

• Name of agreement
• Link to the agreement and the document (contract / attachment)
• Expiration Date of attachment (if provided)
• Snippet of text surrounding the search phrase that is highlighted in yellow for each instance that it finds a match 

• Date contract was modified
• Who (user) that last modified the agreement

Learn More about Contract Management Capabilities