Meet Rikki Jennings, Zebra’s First Chief Nursing Informatics Officer and One of Crain’s Most Notable Women in Healthcare
March is a big month here at Zebra, especially for Rikki Jennings. As Zebra’s (first!) Chief Nursing Informatics Officer, she’s getting ready to head out to HIMSS 2020 in Orlando, Florida, to meet with hospital administrators, clinicians, physicians and even IT specialists from all over the world.
She won’t be trying to sell anything, though.
Rather, her one and only goal will be to fully understand all of healthcare’s pain points. She is going to be asking those she speaks with about:
- The new or lingering risks that nurses and doctors want to mitigate in the course of patient care
- The frequency and cause of communication breakdowns between care teams
- Process failures related to patient identification, specimen collection and much more
- Challenges with continuous patient observation and timely action
- Inventory management requirements and issues
- Spend management and the types of cost reductions that could be most beneficial to the healthcare organization and its patients, who are likely to incur the burden of higher operating expenses
- Internal and external compliance issues, especially with regards to regional and global regulations
By understanding the biggest challenges facing healthcare today, Rikki is in turn able to serve as the “voice of the customer” when helping Zebra and its partners determine how best to design, engineer and implement technology solutions. She can help them guide their efforts toward hardware and software platforms that can directly solve these expressed problems, which helps healthcare providers achieve better patient and operational outcomes.
In a way, Rikki serves as a superhero to healthcare providers and patients alike.
But this is not an easy job by any means. Healthcare is highly dynamic and the global medical community must constantly adapt best practices, processes and procedures to accommodate new diseases, patient demands and operational pressures. Plus, oversight authorities are increasingly introducing measures to help improve provider accountability and patient safety, which makes it even harder for many to understand how to balance patient priorities against business priorities.
Fortunately, Rikki – a nurse herself – is wicked smart and exceptionally adept at what she does. She delivers spectacular results for Zebra and, more importantly, its healthcare customers every day. That is why Crain’s recently named her one of the most Notable Women in Healthcare!
It’s also why we were eager to kick off our 2020 Women’s History Month interview series with this exclusive sit-down with Rikki about her role, current healthcare trends and how she envisions technology-facilitated healthcare evolving in the coming years. She also has some fantastic advice for those who may be interested in pursuing a career in healthcare.
Listen to what she has to say by listening to our latest podcast episode:
YOUR EDGE PODCAST: A Sit-Down with Rikki Jennings
Only have a few minutes? Watch these two short videos of our conversation to get the highlights:
Rikki's take on today's healthcare trends...
Of course, if you’re going to HIMSS 2020, we highly encourage you to stop by Zebra booth #3359 to meet Rikki and talk about your goals and challenges. She is full of wisdom and, as you will quickly learn, an amazing advocate for our customers and their patients. (Which is yet another reason why she is one of the Most Notable Women in Healthcare!)
Zebra’s “Your Edge” Blog Team
The “Your Edge” Blog Team is comprised of content curators and editors from Zebra’s Global PR, Thought Leadership and Advocacy team. Our goal is to connect you with the industry experts best-versed on the issues, trends and solutions that impact your business. We will collectively deliver critical news analysis, exclusive insights on the state of your industry, and guidance on how your organization can leverage a number of different proven technology platforms and strategies to capture your edge.
