As CEO of BAYADA Home Health Care, David Baiada has a national perspective on leading a vast care team. That team will grow by 50,000 in the near term, Baiada shares in this Fast Forward interview.
Baiada also shares insight into the next three years of home health care in general, including perspective on investment in employee retention, engagement and training, and how his organization is infusing technological innovations and clinical delivery advancements into that process.
HHCN: Tell me about the path that led you to your current role.
Baiada: I originally had my sights set on a career outside of BAYADA and home health care. I was interested in entrepreneurship and technology. But as I got a little older, I realized that BAYADA was an inspiring and energizing integration of the things that I was passionate about in my previous career. I could apply those passions to impact the community — and that gave me a sense of purpose.
Ultimately, that’s what drew me here. It’s what has kept me here. It’s what gets me energized every day. It’s this intersection of performance and purpose, and that’s what we’re all about.
In an industry that is changing and evolving all the time, we have to take care of more people in more places, which means we have to innovate. We have to adapt, evolve and be curious. We have to be change-oriented and continuously improving to ensure we can meet the needs of our clients and our caregivers.
Fast forward: Where do you see BAYADA three years from now?
Over the next three years, we’ll hire close to 50,000 people. I think our continued evolution and growth is built on talent. We’ll have an even greater workforce that is continuously inspired, energized and supported. We’ll have 50,000 new people as part of our movement to take care of people at home.
What do you think will be the most significant challenge your organization will have to overcome during that time?
When you’re a large organization delivering in-home services to vulnerable populations, the No. 1 challenge is building and supporting a quality workforce to deliver those services. All of the training and development will get more complicated at scale, but those are the things you have to focus on to protect, preserve and perpetuate what makes us special.
What do you see as the greatest potential source of health care disruption over the next three years?
A lot of people talk about disruption around clinical delivery models and technological innovation. We see the opportunity to be disruptive with our workforce. We are transforming the way we find and select people, the way that we communicate and engage them, and the way we train them, all of which have threads of things like technological innovation. We want to apply what other people are doing to the challenges we face, backed by a great workforce to meet the needs of our clients and their families.
What do you see as the most exciting financial, economic or bottom-line opportunity over the next three years?
There are a lot of opportunities to improve financial performance. Applying technology to deliver better outcomes and better experiences at a lower cost is just one of them. Most of our energy is being applied to innovation in the areas of talent attraction, talent onboarding and training. By reducing attrition and making the onboarding and training experience more energizing and efficient, we can tackle much greater challenges. We can make the largest financial impact by attracting, retaining and empowering the best workforce.
What do you see as the greatest or most profound technological advancement on the horizon with respect to BAYADA and home-based care?
There is a major inflection point in virtual care and management. That is creating a lot of opportunity and excitement around innovation. Three years is a pretty short time frame for technological innovation, but given that we hit this inflection point, I put that at the top of the list.
What about in terms of social influences on the home health care industry? What do you think will be the greatest social influence on your business over the next three years?
Consumerism is a powerful force that will continue to impact our industry. I think consumers’ expectations of high-touch, technology-enabled responsive services is increasing. Many industries deliver a much simpler service with better technology and experiential dynamics. Things like being able to see where your nurse is on a map and how long until they get to your house, or online bill pay — all of us have come to expect these dynamics from a service provider.
A lot of it has been driven by other industries: travel, hospitality, banking, etc. Every other area of our lives is empowered by great technology and high-touch experiences, and that’s going to raise the bar for what consumers expect of us as service providers.
What consumer product or service will have the greatest impact on your industry over the next three years?
Maybe I’ll broaden it and say direct-to-consumer health care-related services and products. Most health care services are referred by professionals. Related to consumerism and consumer expectations, I think there will be an increasing level of consumer decision-making and direct-to-consumer products and services that are built on consumers’ desires to take control of their own health care decisions. I think Medicare Advantage is a great example, but our service is an example too. It will increasingly migrate from an institutionally referred service to a consumer direct service.
Complete the sentence. Three years from now, I hope health care will be …
More reliable and consistent.
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