Not Just a Side Gig: Government Contracting Takes Commitment, Says Booz Allen Hamilton COO, Kristine Martin Anderson

Before taking responsibility for operational performance of Booz
Allen Hamilton – the $9+ billion technology and consulting leader
with 32,000+ employees worldwide – Kristine Martin Anderson built
a career pioneering healthcare IT. Most notably, she spent nearly
14 years at an early innovator in the space, CareScience, where
she helped advance work in quality measurement before overseeing
the launch of the nation’s first web-based clinical decision
support system for hospitals, and the nation’s first health
information exchange, among other groundbreaking
initiatives.

After CareScience, Kristine joined Booz Allen in 2006 to help
grow, and ultimately run, the firm’s healthcare business.
Kristine later became president of the firm’s civilian sector and
ultimately ascended to her current role as chief operating
officer. Nearly all of Booz Allen's business is through
government contracts, and its clients include all of the
cabinet-level departments of the U.S. federal government, from
defense and homeland security, to transportation and public
health.

Kristine’s extensive work with the government and experiences
pioneering healthcare IT put her in a unique position to navigate
the complex demands of the healthcare industry. She shared some
of her knowledge with Keith Figlioli in this episode of
Healthcare is Hard, where they discussed topics including:



Advice for winning government contracts. Kristine’s
biggest advice for organizations looking to drive healthcare
innovation through government contracts is that it’s not a good
side gig. She says working with the government is a commitment
because it’s a customer with long sales cycles, unique
requirements and a need for transparency. But it’s also a big
customer, which she says has the best missions and really
important tasks that have to get done.


How AI adoption will be slow and uneven. Kristine shares
the industry’s excitement for artificial intelligence (AI) and
its potential to transform healthcare, but offers words of
caution around expectations for rapid, widespread adoption. She
points to the example of using AI to analyze radiology images –
one of the first applications of AI in healthcare – and the
fact that it has still only reached 2% of all images. She also
predicts and discusses why government policy makers will be
more reactive than proactive when it comes to regulating AI
innovation.


The state of quality measurement. “Culture is eating
strategy for lunch in the measurement world,” according to
Kristine. She says quality measurement has lost its way as an
unintentional consequence of Meaningful Use and the movement
towards linking quality measures to health IT. She laments how
meaningful data still isn’t available to the public in a way
that can help inform personal healthcare decisions and says
reporting has become more about getting government incentive
for healthcare organizations.


Prospects for entrepreneurs. The need for innovation in
healthcare is bigger than it has ever been before, and Kristine
is optimistic about the ability to empower startups and the
people behind them to change the world. Her advice for
entrepreneurs is to closely monitor the issues that will affect
adoption. She points out how the best ideas don’t always
prevail and says that focusing on levers for adoption is just
as important as an innovation itself.



To hear Keith and Kristine talk about these topics and more,
listen to this episode of Healthcare is Hard: A Podcast for
Insiders.