Occupational Mix Survey: 4 Teams to Collaborate With and 4 Steps to Take
The Occupational Mix Survey is more than a regulatory form—it’s a strategic tool that shapes your hospital’s Medicare payments for years. Effective collaboration across HR, payroll, nursing, IT, and finance can help you complete your Occupational Mix Survey (OMS) today but also set you up for easier completion in the future.
Completing the OMS can be difficult. When time is limited and information is hard to access, cross-department collaboration can become an advantage that helps your team complete the survey with confidence.
Who and What: The Essentials of Collaboration
To complete the OMS, coordination is typically needed across several key hospital departments including HR, payroll, nursing leadership, and IT.
Once you identify the appropriate contact for each team, consider reaching out to collaborate. One of the easiest ways to do this is with an initial outreach that clearly explains what’s needed. In general, here’s what you’ll need from each team.
1. Human Resources
This is the team that stewards the job descriptions and job codes that are used by the hospital. They may be needed to help map internal hospital job codes to the OMS nursing categories that align with the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) occupational categories.
When collaborating with HR, ask for the latest job descriptions and job codes that are used in your payroll system. Explain that these need to map the official BLS occupational categories within the OMS, and you are seeking their help to map the codes correctly.
Additionally, requesting crosswalks of job codes that are tied to the BLS codes can be a helpful approach, because it could provide a guiding document that can be used for future surveys.
2. Payroll
Payroll is typically the source for time, salary, and contract labor data that are needed for the survey. Specifically, payroll can assist in determining which earning code hours should be included or excluded from the survey.
When collaborating with payroll, share how the OMS is a government form that requires detailed data about pay and hours throughout the calendar year. Ask if payroll can provide detailed reports that show the total paid hours and wages at the earning code level, for all employees and contracted staff.
3. Nursing Leadership
The nursing leadership team can clarify how hospital job codes should be linked to the BLS codes. Often, they can help classify roles by nursing categories and clarify ambiguous job duties.
When collaborating with nursing leadership, ask if they can assist with reviewing roles and duties of the nursing staff. By partnering with them to identify how roles should be classified, you can avoid misreporting information.
This is especially true with leadership roles or roles with mixed responsibilities. Specifically, we recommend reviewing the instructions of the survey with nursing leadership so that you can accurately identify any information that needs to be reclassified.
4. Information Technology
In many hospitals, IT supports data extraction from payroll and HR systems.
They’re usually responsible for ensuring that data is accessed properly and securely. Because of this, they may be an important connecting point in the data gathering process. While one department may be responsible for the data, IT may govern how the data reports are shared or accessed. Because of this, collaboration with IT teams is often essential.
When collaborating with IT, identify the specific process your hospital has for getting the information you need. By understanding the process, you can make sure that you plan accordingly to get the reports and support you need. As with the other departments, be prepared to share why the data is important and how it ultimately links to federal funding.
Every hospital is different, so the key idea is to identify who has the information. Then, collaborate with them to complete the survey. Regardless of who should be involved, clear communication and early engagement with these teams can create a foundation for smooth collaboration.
How to Work Together to Optimize Processes for the OMS
Often, the OMS is challenging because the hospital’s payroll data doesn’t easily align to it. If you’re looking to optimize the process, work with HR and payroll to align reports, or create reference documents, that can tie data to what is required in the OMS in the future. Here are four specific things professionals can pursue.
1. Job Description Reference Sheet
Reimbursement professionals can collaborate with HR to create a reference sheet that shows how the hospital’s job descriptions and codes tie to the BLS occupational categories and/or the Occupational Mix Survey categories.
This will reduce guesswork and errors, making the categorization of jobs clearer and more accurate. Additionally, if HR is open to it, the codes and descriptions can be modified to match the BLS codes and descriptions. This would give the easiest alignment for the OMS. However, that may be unrealistic for many hospitals. So, starting with a clear reference sheet could be the best solution to pursue.
2. Create Standardized Reports
Second, reimbursement professionals can collaborate with payroll and IT to create standardized reports that automatically capture the necessary data fields for the OMS. By working together ahead of time to identify the data that’s needed, you can make the data pull simple and streamlined.
3. Review Job Roles and Assess Classifications
Third, reimbursement professionals can streamline processes by working closely with the nursing leaders and department managers to review jobs roles and make sure that classifications are accurate.
4. Establish a Review Cadence
Lastly, reimbursement professionals can establish a regular cadence to review this information. Because the Occupational Mix Survey is due every three years, it can be very manageable to set up a recurring schedule for completing the survey. By planning, and identifying what you need up front, then when it’s time to prepare for the survey, you can simply identify the reports and complete the survey.
In short, the greatest way to collaborate is to prepare today for tomorrow’s survey. Ultimately, how you approach the survey can set your direction.
The OMS provides an opportunity to reinforce data integrity, cross-departmental processes, and financial performance. Organizations that complete the survey and move on may miss an opportunity to truly optimize their processes.
But, organizations that see the survey as an opportunity can develop processes that lead to smoother reporting cycles and stronger reimbursement outcomes.
How to Collaborate with External Third Parties
While internal collaboration is essential, sometimes hospitals benefit from expert help.
If you’re considering hiring a third party to help with your OMS, here are a few principles to keep in mind. First, look for experts who understand the OMS and how it’s related to Medicare reimbursement. Second, identify early what you need, whether that’s a partner to complete the worksheet, or a second set of eyes to review your submission.
Either way, if you need external help, consult with others early in the process.
We’re Here to Help
For personalized guidance and a complimentary analysis of your OMS situation and past results, contact your firm professional. Together, we can collaborate with you to build a stronger approach to health care reimbursement.