Tufts Medicine Upgrades Onboarding & Leadership Training via Mobile

Located in Massachusetts, Tufts Medicine transforms the way that the community engages with and experiences health care. The organization encompasses a team of over 2,300 physicians and 13,000 employees throughout its world-renowned academic medical center, regional health centers, and Care at Home providers. Tufts Medicine brings together the best of community and academic medicine, delivering exceptional and accessible care to over 1.5 million patients annually.

THE CHALLENGE

Tuft’s Medicine is known for its cutting edge innovations in the world of healthcare. The organization wanted to improve its communications strategies to empower and strengthen its diverse workforce of more than 13,000 employees, particularly in leadership training. Email communication was ineffective and new leaders could not easily access the company’s onboarding resources. Additionally, employees were unaware of the organization's available diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) resources. T

THE SOLUTION

Tufts Medicine decided to investigate different technology options to address both their DEI communications and leadership onboarding needs. Ultimately, they chose Engage by Cell’s mobile platform consisting of a text messaging platform combined with a mobile web portal for employee resources. Benefits of the new communication tools included:

• No app downloads required 
• No IT department or web designers are needed
• Changes and additions can be made at any time, in real time
• When users text in they are automatically subscribed to text message communication
• Employees can opt-out at any time
• Text message communication can be segmented into targeted groups
• Text messages can be scheduled in advance or set in a sequence
• Employees can ask questions or submit comments via a one-to-one text chat

OUTCOMES

Mobile communication tools were a necessary step to execute Tufts Medicine’s communication and onboarding goals. Mobile web apps provide an easy-to-use outlet for organizational resources. Two-way text messaging allowed for efficient communication and dialogue among team members.

"The interactive onboarding checklist provides new leaders with a roadmap of their first year in a leadership role.  They get a sequenced text message with a link to the custom checklist at 15, 45, 90, 180, and 270 days!  It is a fun way to keep everyone engaged and on the same page!” - Will Powley, MA, SPHR, System Director Leadership & Learning Institute

The Tufts Medicine team now uses the Engage by Cell to communicate with employees on the device they know best and check most often: their phone. Text message content includes details on employee training, holiday greetings, links to employee surveys, and other important events and alerts.

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