I'm assuming many of you have made some sort of resolutions for 2017, even if the resolution was to no longer make New Year resolutions.Personally, I really like this time of year. I enjoy looking back at my calendar to review where I've been and what conversations I've had, and I really enjoy looking ahead and dreaming about the future me, or in this case, the future Koble Group.
For those that don't know a lot about our company history, we were formed two years ago this month. Our name "Koble" is Norwegian for "Connect."
We spent our first year working on primarily one project, doing integration work for a Health Information Exchange (HIE) in the state of New York. While we were busy on that, we started growing our team going from one employee to seven by the end of 2015, in anticipation of some bigger projects and an expanded set of services that would benefit healthcare providers across the U.S.
We knew that to be truly interoperable, healthcare organizations need to remove various barriers. Some don't have IT staff - or maybe not enough IT staff. Others may have issues with Compliance or Meaningful Use. To help meet those needs, we ventured into the Managed Services Provider space - again, exclusive to healthcare organizations - and we solidified our help desk team by adding state of the art tools and a new Customer Relationship Management solution for our internal needs.
As 2016 started, we added a Service Manager position and the added two essential positions - a Chief Privacy Officer/Compliance Officer and a Chief Technology Officer.
Now with ten employees, we are ready to fully engage with our potential clients to offer Managed Services, Privacy and Security Compliance, HIM and Revenue Cycle consulting services, Integration Engineering - and another service that we are really good at: HIE management and services.
We were certified by the Minnesota Department of Health in November 2015 as one of three certified Health Information Organizations in Minnesota and have spent much of the past year preparing to go "live" with our Orion Health-based Health Information Exchange, connecting providers and patients across the state. We also provide Tier 1 Help Desk services to Participants of the North Dakota Health Information Network, and are working to provide Help Desk and other services to additional HIE's across the country, as well.
We are getting ready for a big announcement next month, which will further cement us as a leader in the HIE space and have been adding clients right and left to our Managed Services and Compliance/HIM Services stacks.
That's just a brief look at the past two years...I wanted to establish a baseline for you to figure out what we're all about.
Where do we see things going in 2017? We know we're going to grow our client base, which means we'll be growing our team, as well. They say it takes about three years for a business to really get going. If that's true, then our third year of operation should be pretty fun to be a part of.
I'm excited enough to start a blog - one of my 2017 resolutions. I've done this off and on over the years, usually a part of a resolution. This time, I hope to make it stick. We'll use this forum, along with a newsletter and other communication methods, to keep you updated on all things Koble, and also give you information to help you better understand various compliance and Health IT issues that may affect you.
We hope you enjoy this - and we hope you have a successful New Year!!
