CASE STUDY
Encompass Health
Driving brand-led transformation of organization and culture
Challenge
After HealthSouth, a leading provider of inpatient rehabilitation expanded its position in post-acute care by acquiring Encompass Home Health & Hospice, the two companies needed to align on a brand that would support their business strategy. The new brand would have to stand out in the crowded U.S. healthcare space and work to unify a combined 35,000 employee workforce.
Solutions
Prophet helped to create a distinct brand strategy that communicated HealthSouth’s commitment to driving integrated care and improving health outcomes. As a result, a powerful new brand emerged, one that drew upon the strengths of both HealthSouth and Encompass Home Health & Hospice to communicate something bigger, stronger, and more united: Encompass Health.
The decision to rebrand represented a significant change, as employees felt great pride in the companies they had respectively built. Prophet worked to define a new purpose to function as the guiding North Star and to inspire employees and the broader set of stakeholders, including patients and healthcare partners. Through thousands of employee submissions and interactive group sessions, Prophet uncovered the critical elements of the culture and ways of working that need to be transformed into a core set of values. These values would be shared across the business to equip employees to lead the change. To do so, Prophet developed and activated a detailed engagement and communications program, that reached from the company’s executive leadership team, as well as to local leaders and front-line employees.
The company’s employer brand also needed to reflect the promise and opportunities of a more integrated and forward-thinking healthcare company. Prophet teams developed an Employee Value Proposition (EVP) to align the enterprise brand and worked to refine messaging and experiences for recruiting talent.
Finally, the company did not have a marketing and communications function but recognized the importance of having a dedicated organization to steward the new brand and optimize the company’s investment. Prophet designed the organization and operating model needed for a new marketing and communications division and stood up this team throughout its first year with the planning, processes and governance needed to create sustained impact.
Results
The Encompass Health brand launched on January 1, 2018, with the Encompass Health brand gradually rolling out across all 127 hospitals and 237 home health and hospice agencies through the first quarter of 2019.
The transformation is already realizing a tremendous impact. 100 percent of Human Resources Directors surveyed agreed the company was successful in defining a set of values that represented the strengths of the employee culture. In the initial markets to transition to the Encompass Health brand, including Alabama and Texas, job applications increased by 18 percent year-over-year in the first six months after the rebrand because of the new EVP and recruiting experiences. Finally, the new marketing and communications function at Encompass Health made a number of hires to round out needed capabilities – following Prophet’s plans. Its leader was promoted to VP from within and now sits on the company’s Strategic Council.
“Throughout this process, we worked closely with Prophet to define a brand strategy that would improve awareness of our business strategy and the value proposition for each of our business segments.”
Mark Tarr
President and Chief Executive Officer, Encompass Health
Impact
100%
approval rating on values by HR Directors
18%
year-over-year increase in job applications