How to Operationalize Digital Transformation Strategy?

Andrea Marks joined Walmart in 2021 as Vice President of Digital Transformation.  In this role, Andrea leads clinical data and analytics, interoperable care delivery technologies, and health consumer digital experience.  She is additionally responsible for assessing and devising the strategic plan for the collection of health and wellness data and technology resources to enable the broader Walmart Health & Wellness strategy and delivery of outcomes.

Andrea has 30 years of healthcare experience steeped in clinical analytics and reporting. Prior to Walmart, she was the Vice President of People Analytics Center of Excellence at United Health Group, and spent eight years at OptumRx, as Senior Vice President and Chief Analytics Officer where she was responsible for analytic development for the company’s PBM services, modeling outcome measurement and integrated client reporting.  Andrea also served as Chief Informatics Officer at Blue Health Intelligence, as well as senior clinical analytic roles at Blue Cross Blue Shield Association, CVS/Caremark, and the University of Chicago.

Below is the conversation that we had with her.

As Vice President, Digital Transformation for Walmart Health & Wellness, what are some of your key roles and responsibilities that you have on a daily basis at Walmart?

Digital transformation functions as the connective tissue across the Walmart Health & Wellness organization to help us become more digital and scalable, and supports every line of business including Pharmacy, Vision, and Omnichannel Care. With this is mind, I continuously prioritize our technology development roadmap and work to ensure we have the right team in place to deploy scalable solutions.  I am accountable for making sure we have the right data structures in place, that our systems are built with interoperability, and that our consumer digital experiences are structured the right way to ensure positive outcomes and engagement at scale.  I am responsible for maintaining communication and connectivity across all of our business leaders by connecting people, creating relationships, and removing ambiguity within our roadmap.

What are some of the challenges existing for the leaders looking to establish digital transformation at their organizations especially when it comes to retail healthcare space?

One if the biggest challenges for leaders entering this space are balancing the delivery of the short-term needs with the long-term vision of fully integrated capabilities that drive value at scale.  Moving from paper-based processes or from isolated experiences is at the heart of any digital transformation journey.  These journeys are long and making the right decisions at the front end is critical to long term success. There is a continual balance of time and resources-deciding how much you’re going to invest and how quickly you’re going to build capabilities, and also deciding which investments are going to help you scale. While you may gravitate towards a solution to meet a need in the short-term, you still have to keep an eye toward long-term scalability. There’s always the balance of today versus the future.

As for retail healthcare, we are at the early stages of our journey to address health and wellness from a different angle.  But Walmart is all in! By leveraging our trusted engagements with consumers we are using our digital transformation work to solidify their trust in us in delivering health and wellness services.  Getting all the digital transformation activities right, from the start, is critical to building that trust and long-term loyalty.  

Can you give us more details about digital transformation projects that you have operationalized at Walmart? How is your organization using digital transformation to make strides in the retail healthcare space?

We’ve been focused on building out new capabilities in our omnichannel services, like our Health Centers and Virtual Health, as well as modernizing our core pharmacy and vision businesses to deliver new innovative services that drive measurable value in the marketplace.  This requires the expansion and interoperability of core capabilities that also support flexibility to meet the local market needs.  Healthcare is local, and our services need to meet consumers where they are, whether in our physical or virtual assets.  Creating that omnichannel experience has been a big focus of ours, while ensuring that all the experiences are connected, the way our consumers expect. 

“By leveraging our trusted engagements with consumers we are using our digital transformation work to solidify their trust in us in delivering health and wellness services”

One of the most notable projects of the past year, touching millions of our consumers on their health, has been collaborating with our pharmacy operations team on the technology build-out for delivering COVID-19 immunizations and creating a digital vaccine record. It is amazing to see someone quickly be able to access their vaccine records from their phone through the Walmart app versus remembering to bring a non-digital paper record with them.  Healthcare needs these digital advancements, and I am excited to see this expand.  We delivered the solution not just for COVID, but with the intent to make it scalable to meet the needs of other areas of the business.  Again, meeting today’s needs with an eye to the future. 

What would be your piece of advice for your fellow peers and leaders?

Digital transformation is centered around clearly understanding the experiences and outcomes that you want to deliver.  Start there and work backwards all the way to the detailed data elements and structures.  Data is a critical part of the equation and is often an afterthought.  Make it front and center to your entire digital transformation strategy.  I’d also encourage my peers to continue to think about the long-term. Once you make an investment, it’s hard to reverse it, so focus on making the right decisions around the technology and operational processes, and make sure that the scalability of those solutions are aligned to your overall strategy.

Lastly, like anything in life, focus on building the relationships and listening to the needs of your customers.  Strong relationships will lead to deeper conversations and ensure you have the right understanding of the long-term so that you stage the digital transformation in the right way.