When moving forward with any new project or adventure (personal, business, or otherwise), typically we’ll make a run at defining success. When am I going to be finished? What are my expectations? What are the expectations of others, especially of those who are financing the project? How does one keep score? If you do not know how to score or don’t even keep score, how do you measure your success and report it to your stakeholders?

Defining success in some things is easier than in others. I’m writing this article on the heels of Super Bowl XXXIX, and it’s clear to me that for National Football League teams, winning the Super Bowl is the definitive metric of success. Winning three out of four is unparalleled excellence, as the New England Patriots have superbly accomplished. (Being a Green Bay Packers fan, however, I was just glad for a great game and mildly funny commercials.)

At the start of any new technology purchase, it’s important to define the project’s objectives and to set realistic goals. It doesn’t matter whether these metrics or deliverables are easily measured, are representative of “hard-dollar” savings, are intangible efficiency gains, or are enterprise-wide integration goals. The expected outcomes of a project need to be defined in advance, current performance must be benchmarked, and a clear understanding of what the technology can achieve and deliver must be reached. This is the only way that you will be able to set realistic metrics with which to measure the defined goals. At this juncture, it’s also important to note that without proper system design, implementation, or planning, even the greatest technology might not achieve your goals. Contrary to the famous line from the 1989 movie Field of Dreams, if you build it, they won’t necessarily come. And, more importantly, if you build it partially or incompletely and they do come, they will more than likely not stay.

Again, setting proper, well-defined, researched, and realistic goals is critical from both sides of the goal-setting process. When you set goals that are too low, it can appear that you don’t have the faith in the project that your enterprise or senior leadership would expect to see from you and your team. As a result, you could put the project’s funding at risk. When you set goals that are too high or are unobtainable, you risk setting expectations that might never-or might only infrequently-be attained. If that happens, then no matter how good the purchased technology is or how good your planning and implementation are, the realization that the bar is unreachable can demotivate your team. The support and buy-in of your decision-making and implementation team is key to your project’s success.

At times, the project’s financial viability can lead to a tweaking of the promised results, especially when a positive return on investment is mandated. Before adjusting the system design, everyone needs to agree on how the workflow will be impacted. Every decision made affects the expected outcome. Many times, the technology that will be purchased is required to support an enterprise-wide infrastructure to achieve success for other new systems. This can lead to purchasing technology that does not necessarily support the most critical of the outlined goals. Trying to make a square peg fit into a round hole is never a successful venture.

Is your project focused toward driving cost-savings? For PACS projects, many clients are looking to eliminate off-site storage or courier costs as well as reduce film, processing, and supply costs. Sometimes, the technology will allow you to avoid spending capital to support your legacy environment. And, of course, there is always the pressure to reduce full-time employees. Don’t be tempted to set your goals or targets based on what some other facility has or hasn’t done. As implied earlier, many projects succeed or fail independent of the product selected or its capability. I coach all vendors, when pitching their product to a hospital, to focus on why their product will succeed, not why another vendor’s product will fail.

As mentioned, some projects are measured solely on their ability to deliver efficiency improvements or a combination of several intangible benefits. And certainly, you’ll want to evaluate these benefits – on which it is very difficult to assign a “hard” cost value – whether they’re integral to the stated goals or not. For example, when looking at a PACS project, consider the speed of image acquisition, interpretation, diagnosis, and implementation of treatment. What is each one’s economic value? Without question, these aspects have value; however, assigning that value is very difficult.

Generally, all things being equal, the ability to attract and retain the highest level of talent also can be tied to the level of technology in place to support your department. Physician satisfaction with radiology services preproject versus postproject can be another metric available, via surveying the physicians before and after implementation.

And, most importantly, facility competitiveness in your healthcare marketplace often needs to be considered. If other facilities are taking advantage of technology to improve service and quality levels, efficiencies, and end-user friendliness, there certainly is value to either taking the lead or staying competitive.

In closing, one of the first key elements of every radiology project is to invest your time and clearly define your goals, including how and by when you can expect to achieve them. Be realistic, and leverage your vendor’s and/or your consultant’s experience in planning your project. As my dad has always told me, “Measure twice, cut once.”

Michael Mack is VP of business development at the Thomas Group Ltd (Anaheim, Calif). Having more than 20 years of experience in the medical imaging industry, Mack now specializes in PACS planning and implementation.