The Adoption Gap – Part 4: Building the Org That Can Actually Change
This is the fourth and final part of an op-ed series on technology adoption in skilled nursing, focusing on what the organization that actually gets this right looks like — and how do you build it?
We’ve spent three parts diagnosing the problem.
Your staff isn’t the obstacle. Your vendor probably oversold you. And the longer you wait to cross the chasm, the harder the jump becomes.
Now comes the part nobody publishes: What does the organization that actually gets this right look like — and how do you build it?
Because here’s the truth the industry has been dancing around for a decade: technology doesn’t transform organizations. Organizations transform organizations — and then technology accelerates what’s already in motion.
The Winning Formula Isn’t What You Think
Provider Magazine’s 2026 Long-Term Care Trends report put it plainly: “Across the continuum, the winning organizations will be the ones that treat workforce stability as a core strategy, equip frontline leaders with real decision-making tools, and use technology to remove friction — rather than replace relationships.”¹
Read that again. Not technology-first. People-first, technology-enabled.
Skilled Nursing News’ Executive Outlook found that nursing home leaders moving from survival mode to strategic growth share a common thesis: focus on what you can control — care delivery models, workforce engagement, operational efficiency, and technology-enabled transformation.² That shift — from reactive to intentional — is the foundation everything else is built on.
The Four Pillars of a Technology-Ready SNF Organization
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Pillar 1: Leadership Owns It — Not IT
Research from Kaufman Hall is unambiguous: organizations where senior leaders actively own technology initiatives are three times more likely to achieve measurable value.³ Not IT. Not the project manager. Not the vendor’s implementation team. The CEO, the COO, the DON — with their names on the outcome and their credibility on the line.
When the administrator treats a technology rollout as an IT project, they’ve already predicted the outcome. When they treat it as an operational strategy — showing up to huddles, asking for data, connecting the tool to clinical goals — everything changes. -
Pillar 2: The DON Is Your Chief Adoption Officer
Every successful technology implementation in post-acute care has one thing in common: a clinical champion with organizational authority who believed in it before it was proven.⁴
The DON sits at the intersection of clinical credibility and operational influence. When she stands in front of the charge nurses and says, “I’ve seen the data, and this matters,” it lands differently than any executive memo ever will.
The question isn’t whether you have a DON. It’s whether you’ve invested in her as a change agent. Does she have dedicated time for implementation oversight? A seat at the technology selection table? A framework for coaching her team through resistance? -
Pillar 3: Build a Repeatable Adoption Model
The facilities that sustain technology adoption aren’t doing anything magical. They’ve built a repeatable internal process — and they run every new tool through it.⁵
That model has five steps, no exceptions:
1. Landscape first. Before any contract is signed, assess current workflow, staff readiness, and the specific clinical problem you’re solving. Unit by unit.
2. Design with the floor. Involve charge nurses and CNAs in workflow design before go-live. Not a focus group — actual design input that changes the implementation.
3. Launch small. One unit. One champion. Ninety days of obsessive measurement. Use that data as your internal proof point before you scale.
4. Support through the dip. Every implementation has a productivity dip between go-live and fluency. Staff it, plan for it, and don’t mistake the dip for failure.
5. Celebrate the win loudly. When outcomes improve, make them visible. A readmission was prevented. A fall was caught early. These aren’t footnotes — they’re the story you tell to build the next cohort of believers.
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Pillar 4: Build the Data Infrastructure Before You Need It
The coming era of value-based care, ACO partnerships, and preferred network contracting will be won or lost on one asset: data.⁶ Not just having it — but being able to act on it in real time, share it with partners, and use it to demonstrate outcomes to payers.
LeadingAge has been explicit: SNFs need investment in FHIR-based interoperability and standard API connectivity, not as an aspirational goal but as a survival requirement.⁷ The facilities building this infrastructure today will be the ones with the data stories that win contracts tomorrow.
The Self-Assessment Every Operator Needs to Have
| Technology-Ready | Still Developing | At-Risk | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Leadership | C-suite owns tech outcomes | IT owns tech projects | No one owns it |
| Clinical Champions | DON leads adoption | DON aware but not empowered | No clinical champion |
| Adoption Model | A repeatable process exists | Ad hoc per rollout | No defined process |
| Post-Launch Support | 90-day structured plan | Vendor dependent | Go-live = done |
| Data Infrastructure | Real-time, interoperable | Partially connected | Siloed or paper |
If more than two of your answers land in the “At-Risk” column — you don’t have a technology problem. You have an organizational readiness problem. And no vendor, no matter how good their demo is, can fix that for you.
This Is the Work
Over four parts, we’ve established something the industry has been reluctant to say directly: the SNF sector doesn’t have a technology problem. It has an adoption problem — rooted in culture, leadership, vendor dynamics, and organizational infrastructure.
The tools exist. The clinical evidence is mounting. The regulatory pressure is no longer coming — it’s here.⁶ The operators who will define post-acute care for the next decade are building adoption-ready organizations right now. Not waiting for the perfect tool. Not waiting for margins to improve. Not waiting for someone else to go first.
They are doing the hard, unglamorous work of building the organizational muscle to change — repeatedly, reliably, and at scale.
That is the real competitive advantage in skilled nursing. Not the technology. The capacity to adopt it.
⁷ LeadingAge. “Building Interoperability: A Call for Investment, Not Penalties.” July 2025. https://leadingage.org/building-interoperability-a-call-for-investment-not-penalties/
About the Author
Mordy Eisenberg is co-founder and chief growth officer at TapestryHealth, a clinical support and remote monitoring company serving post-acute and long-term care facilities. With deep experience as a long-term care and skilled nursing executive, Mordy sits at the intersection of clinical operations and technology adoption — focused on helping SNF operators close the gap between purchasing technology and actually embedding it into culture and workflow. His work spans value-based care strategy, clinical program design, and the organizational change management required to make health technology deliver on its promise at the bedside. He writes and speaks regularly on the operational realities facing post-acute operators navigating an era of unprecedented clinical and financial disruption.
