Messiah Lifeways Invests Time Where it Counts with Sage Intacct

CHALLENGES

The Need for Change

Messiah Lifeways is dedicated to providing love and care to older adults in residential communities and at home. During the past century, Messiah Lifeways has evolved without wavering from its mission of enhancing the livelihood of older adults with Christ-like love. 

This high-quality care is only possible if all of the organization’s team members and resources work in tandem, a necessity that is often challenged by industry changes and company growth. When Tracy Biesecker joined Messiah Lifeways as CFO in 2018, she saw dissonance between Messiah Lifeways employees and the software they used.

“We did have a legacy system that was on-premise,” said Tracy. “It was a great system when it was first implemented, but it sort of didn’t grow with our industry and our size. What we were looking for was a little bit more of a flexible option and an ability to redefine how we produce data.”

From an organizational perspective, Messiah Lifeways quantified success based on revenue margins, occupancy (percent of beds or residences filled), and hours billed for home care. Tracy and the finance team had more specific, individual goals to keep track of small but influential changes to accounting processes and collaborations with other departments. 

In late 2018, Messiah Lifeways determined their existing electronic health record (EHR) software was outdated and needed to be replaced. By nature of being a continuing care organization focused on community, leadership came together to determine that, if new software was necessary, it would either need to be a fully integrated solution or software that could easily integrate with other in-house programs.

SOLUTIONS

The Search for Software

Messiah Lifeways wanted a system that would bring a resident from the outside into the community and support that resident for the duration of their stay. Unfortunately, despite the saturated healthcare software market, finding and implementing a single solution that checked all of the boxes was not possible. 

Several members of the Messiah Lifeways team collaborated on a needs and wants analysis, listing the features that were absolutely crucial for operations and the features that would be nice, but weren’t necessarily priorities. Then, the team compared these needs and wants to solutions that matched their size and budget. With every need laid out before them, the team realized that even the best fit option, PointClickCare, didn’t have the level of accounting depth that they needed. However, PointClickCare did check plenty of boxes, and with an end-of-life deadline for their existing system looming, Messiah Lifeways took the plunge and implemented that software.

Around this time, the finance team voiced concerns about the organization’s accounting software reaching end-of-life for its current version. Messiah Lifeways reached out to local healthcare providers, shared their story, and asked for some perspective. One of the companies they reached out to was Tel Hai Retirement Community, a fellow CCRC that had overhauled its software environment a few years prior. The Tel Hai team gave Messiah Lifeways a company to check out: Cargas Systems.

Messiah Lifeways reached out to Cargas and shared the list of needs and wants. Cargas compared those needs and wants with different accounting software options, and immediately identified Sage Intacct as a great fit.

BENEFITS

The Excitement of Growth

While change of any kind can cause undue stress on companies, Messiah Lifeways was confident in the decision. The interpersonal relationship with Cargas team members was a huge benefit, according to Director of Financial Operations Michele Brown.

“It seems to be one of the last types of relationships with a vendor where you talk to people, they call, they dig in with you […] I don’t feel like every time I reach out I’m having to reintroduce myself and say what we do and describe our system,”

~ Michele Brown, Director of Financial Operations, Messiah Lifeways

Beyond the personal benefits awarded by the relationship with Cargas, Messiah Lifeways has enjoyed the integration of Sage Intacct into the company’s software environment. Sage Intacct’s API is public and accessible to anyone, letting it easily sync with other solutions at Messiah Lifeways, including PointClickCare. Compared to the archaic legacy system Messiah Lifeways transitioned away from, Sage Intacct is a modern and intuitive solution. 

One of the biggest changes that has come about with the implementation of Sage Intacct is a shift in reporting. Messiah Lifeways’ legacy software wasn’t actually their original reporting system—prior to Sage Intacct, the accounting team ran reports through software that was separate from their legacy program, dumping data to import and export between solutions. While this wasn’t a lengthy process, a single error could render several minutes of file transfers pointless. Since the reporting capabilities are built into Sage Intacct rather than existing as a separate solution, reporting is incredibly flexible and helps the team save minutes each day.

It’s also easier to share these reports with the company at large. Now, managers from various departments receive automatic notifications when reports are prepared, and these managers can drill down into specifics if they have questions. The result is less time spent talking about reports and more time spent talking about how to provide even more exceptional care for residents.

“When we first went to Sage, all along we knew there would be process efficiencies, , and the goal was to reinvest that time [in more valuable activities like report analysis], not eliminate it.”

~ Tracy Biesecker, CFO, Messiah Lifeways

Messiah Lifeways has done just that. By refocusing their team on payroll and accounts payable functionality, they’ve been able to reinvest their time and gain efficiency for processes like reporting. 

Another major benefit of Sage Intacct is its cloud platform. Even prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, the team at Messiah Lifeways knew they needed software that could keep pace with multiple locations and grow alongside the organization. On-premise legacy software was clunky and created a communication lag between campuses. After implementing Sage Intacct, and while navigating a global pandemic, Messiah Lifeways has been able to maintain a hybrid work model for remote and on-location employees, keep resident files up-to-date, and ensure the security of all data. 

CONCLUSION

Self-sufficiency—and efficiency as a whole—have allowed the Messiah Lifeways team to dedicate more time towards enhancing the lives of older adults in their care. And, with Cargas serving as a trusted tech partner, Messiah Lifeways doesn’t have to fret over basic or tedious logistics. Instead, Messiah Lifeways can continue to provide compassionate care to older adults in south-central Pennsylvanians.

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