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Health systems know they need to transform the consumer experience. It’s well known that disconnected digital experiences frustrate patients and increasingly burden health system operations. The healthcare industry sees other industries orchestrate seamless, personalized interactions across channels. But when it comes to securing the budget to do it themselves, the conversation gets complicated fast.
Who pays for it? Marketing? Digital? IT? Strategy? Innovation? Transformation Office? If new ideas don’t fit neatly into a single department’s budget, they often get stuck in endless discussions — or worse, sidelined altogether.
This is the challenge that many health system leaders are facing today. They believe in the need for true experience orchestration, but don’t know how to sell it internally. If you’re that champion — the person who sees the potential but needs to make the business case — you’re not alone.
Here’s how to navigate the internal budget landscape and get buy-in for a solution that benefits the entire organization.
Healthcare organizations typically operate in silos. Marketing owns the website. IT manages the patient portal. Digital experience teams might run the mobile app, while innovation teams explore new technology pilots. Each function has its own budget and priorities, which makes cross-functional investments — like a consumer experience orchestration platform — tricky.
Unlike a new website redesign or a standalone app, consumer experience orchestration spans multiple departments. It requires alignment across teams that don’t always collaborate or share budgets. But there’s good news. Organizations are evolving, and so is the way that they budget for digital transformation.
More health systems are recognizing that consumer experience isn’t just a marketing or IT initiative — it’s an enterprise-wide priority. Some organizations have created new roles, like Chief Transformation Officers, to oversee cross-functional initiatives.
If your health system doesn’t have a transformation leader, don’t worry. The key is finding a champion at the executive level — whether it’s the Chief Information Officer, Chief Marketing Officer, Chief Innovation Officer, Chief Digital Officer, or Chief Experience Officer — who understands the value of orchestrating experiences across the consumer journey. These leaders can help navigate internal structures and build a coalition to secure funding.
Health systems exploring consumer experience orchestration often face the challenge of securing funding. While each organization’s budget structure varies, health systems with successful experience orchestration platforms have leveraged three primary approaches:
1. Chargeback Model
Some health systems allocate costs across departments based on their respective benefits from the orchestration platform. Providence, for example, uses an internal chargeback model, ensuring that each team contributing to and benefiting from a solution can share in the costs. This allows for distributed financial responsibility while aligning spending with value realization. Examples of how different teams can contribute include:
This model ensures that experience orchestration is financially sustainable and directly tied to the value each department gains.
2. Enterprise Transformation Office Model
Another strategy that can be used is centralizing digital transformation funding under an enterprise-wide function. A prominent Indianapolis based health system has taken this approach by rolling up digital, marketing, and innovation budgets under a single leadership structure — the Enterprise Transformation Office. By consolidating decision-making and funding under one entity, they eliminate budget silos and accelerate investment in cross-functional digital initiatives. This structure allows health systems to prioritize experience orchestration as part of a broader transformation strategy, rather than requiring individual departments to negotiate funding contributions.
3. Pre-Committed Cloud Spend
A third approach leverages existing cloud commitments. Many health systems have pre-negotiated agreements with cloud providers, allocating a certain level of spend over time. Rather than seeking additional capital, organizations can strategically apply their pre-committed cloud budget toward experience orchestration platforms, maximizing existing investments in infrastructure. By using this method, health systems can accelerate their digital transformation efforts without requiring new budget approvals, making orchestration more feasible within existing financial constraints.
Most health systems aren’t opposed to investing in consumer experience; they just need a clear business case. Here’s how to build one:
Getting buy-in for a cross-functional investment requires more than a compelling case — it requires internal alignment. Here are some ways to make that happen:
As technology advances, health systems must evolve their decision-making processes. Experience orchestration isn’t just a technology investment — it’s an organizational shift toward a more connected, patient-centered future.
If your health system is struggling with fragmented decision-making, take this as an opportunity to lead. Help your colleagues see the big picture, make the financial case, and push for the organizational change needed to support true consumer experience orchestration. The systems that figure this out first won’t just enhance patient experience — they’ll gain a competitive advantage in the rapidly changing healthcare landscape.
