How Iora Health did CareOps

We hosted Dr. Andrew Schutzbank, the Ex-SVP of Product at Iora for 9+ years.

Here are the main takeaways: 

(1) Iora's early success was fueled by health coaches from the community. These coaches shared the same cultural backgrounds, economic realities, and immigration stories as their patients, fostering deep connection and trust.But Iora lost this "community match" over time, which Andrew thinks was a mistake.(2) Chirp, their homegrown EHR, came up a lot. Here are some nuggets:

• Primary care is all about managing relationships. Like any good process, there’s always a next step. Iora built Chirp because they needed a CRM more than a traditional EHR. Imagine Basecamp/Jira but for healthcare.
• When Iora started, there weren’t many tools available (unlike today). Andrew would still build a CRM around the care model but also advised buying existing tools where you can. They were savvy about not building anything they didn’t need if it wasn’t differentiated.
• Andrew used a great analogy: most EHRs are like putting a message in a bottle and throwing it in the ocean, ignoring the patient’s context. Chirp aimed to change that by keeping the bigger picture in focus.

(3) Initially, they tried to standardize care but found there were too much confusion and politics (who argued the best won). Insteadof getting caught up in politics, they decided to focus on outcomes. The goal was to ensure everyone aimed for the same results.

‍(4) Many nuggets were shared on how to create a culture of continuous improvement:

• Buy copies of the Phoenix Project for everyone in the leadership team and make it a must-read. Discuss it together!
• Adopt the "Three Ways" of DevOps:
  • Make Work Visible: The hardest part, but crucial.
  • Amplify Feedback Loops: Ensure everyone gets and gives feedback.
  • Create a Mindset of Experimentation: Encourage trying new things and learning from them.
• Ensure people are there for the right reasons, believe in the mission, and embrace ambiguity. With the right attitude, magic happens.

(5) Metrics are smoke, testimonials are fire. Andrew stressed the importance of the "Gemba mentality" – go to where the action is. Metrics can show you interesting things, but you need to see what's really happening. Attend a morning huddle, whether in-person or virtually. Are people looking at each other or buried in their laptops? If they're avoiding eye contact, you have a leadership and cultural problem. Seeing these interactions firsthand tells you more than any metric can.

There's much more insight packed into the full recording. I highly recommend watching the replay to learn from Iora's approach to blending healthcare evidence with DevOps principles.Watch the replay here.

Quick intro: we’re Thomas and Rik, building Awell - a low-code platform allowing care teams to design, implement and optimize care flows in days, not months. CareOps grew out of our years spent improving CareOps at innovative providers.