Donica Ward-Adams' Resume

Managing Member | Donica Consulting LLC

Strategic healthcare IT consultancy delivering fractional leadership and ad hoc strategic advisory services to bridge legacy EHRs and clinical workflows to emerging technologies.

Senior Manager, Client Application Services | Oracle

Oracle Health IT Managed Services (1100+ employees, 20 global clients). Report to the Director of Application Leveraged Services and manage 5 direct reports while coordinating 100+ leveraged resources. Directly responsible for a $1.4M client engagement with participation in broader divisional budget planning.

• Directing a $1.4M strategic engagement for a Midwestern health system, delivering five modernization projects and staff augmentation for 18 application areas. Successfully launched the first 2 projects and achieved an initial go-live within two months with zero end-user issues, resulting in immediate measurable time savings and improved clinician satisfaction.
• Validates organizational readiness and proposal accuracy by creating or vetting comprehensive staffing plans for all prospective IT Managed Services clients. Aligns resource allocation with complex clinical requirements to secure high-value engagements, including the $1.4M Midwestern US health system contract above.
• Successfully transitioned ticket volume away from critical embedded staff to leveraged services teams (9.5% to 22.3% in 9 months), creating a model that more easily adapts to the ebb and flow of individual client needs. Client satisfaction was not only maintained during this transition, but improved from 4.72 to 4.90 out of 5.
• Architected a global ‘Follow-the-Sun’ support model that transitioned implementation and support tasks to standard staff work hours across time zones, significantly reducing the need for client-side off-hour shifts and corresponding burnout while maintaining extended operational coverage for health system support.
• Built the division’s largest internal community by establishing the ITMS AI Innovators group, scaling membership to 11.5% of total staff, all volunteers. Directed the design of internal AI tools and use cases, driving proactive AI adoption across the organization.

Senior Manager, Client Application Services | Cerner Corporation, Embedded with Adventist Health

Directed clinical application support, device integration, and projects for Nursing, Pharmacy, and Ancillaries across Adventist Health, a 27-hospital system with 3,700+ beds and 440+ sites of care. Reported to the Client Leader (VP) and managed a total team span of 30+.

• Outperformed organizational productivity benchmarks by directing a team that resolved 33% of all system tickets while comprising only 25% of the total embedded staff. Consistently maintained 100% compliance with contractual turnaround time (TAT) metrics.
• Re-engineered a failing EHR roadmap governance process, collaborating with business owners to align project intake with strategic goals; delivered data-driven recommendations that secured enterprise-wide prioritization.
• Elevated Associate Favorability Scores for Trust and Healthy Conflict from 53.3% to 84.7% by spearheading intentional trust-based culture creation and team engagement initiatives.
• Spearheaded a global resource expansion in Bangalore, India, designing a dedicated team model with localized HR management to ensure operational alignment. Pilot program successfully scaled across multiple Oracle IT managed services teams, improving service continuity and resource scalability.

Manager, Client Application Services | Cerner Corporation, Embedded with Adventist Health

Expanded management scope to direct clinical application support for Pharmacy, Outpatient Rehab, and Nutritional Services, in addition to prior scope. Reported to the Client Leader (VP) and managed a total team span of 20–30 members.

• Achieved top decile for Cerner LightsOn alignment for both physicians and nursing. Nursing moved more than 20 percentage points, from 69.6% to 90.1%.
• Drove adoption of Cerner Advance Kits, incorporated hundreds of Cerner Model recommendations, and increased Cerner Blueprint to Model overall scores by 59 points.
• Advanced organizational inclusivity and cultural competency by designing and facilitating Diversity and Inclusion workshops on microaggressions, fostering a more equitable and collaborative environment across the team.

Manager, Portfolio Leader | Cerner Corporation, Embedded with Adventist Health

Reported to the Client Leader (VP) and managed 5–8 direct reports, with dotted-line leadership of 100+ personnel during project execution. Directed large-scale implementations across hospitals and associated clinics within a multi-state health system.

• Executed a seamless full-suite implementation of Cerner and third-party applications for a 209-bed hospital and associated clinics as Program Manager and Executive Liaison. Achieved zero EHR downtime, ensuring continuous clinical operations and meeting all project success metrics.
• Led the IT managed services (aka ITWorks) PMO through November 2019. Then under the same title, switched roles to lead three teams in support of Nursing, Inpatient Rehab, Respiratory Therapy, Case Management, and other assorted ancillaries for Cerner and third party solutions, as well as device integration.
• Transformed application support performance by implementing an iterative strategy to resolve persistent Key Performance Indicator (KPI) deficiencies. Successfully elevated team performance to consistently meet and exceed all contractual and organizational best-practice standards.
• Directed the enterprise-wide digital response to COVID-19 as the primary point of contact for Cerner, managing 249+ critical work efforts within the first four months. Spearheaded the rapid launch of new service lines, including Hospital at Home within 4 weeks from contract signature to first patient. Ensured emergency response readiness and clinical continuity across the health system throughout the pandemic.

Manager, Lead Project Manager | Cerner Corporation, Embedded with Adventist Health

Transitioned to Cerner leadership following a strategic IT managed services outsourcing agreement. Reported to the Client Leader (VP) and managed 3–5 direct reports with dotted-line responsibility for 100+ personnel during enterprise-wide project execution.

• Established and led a successful Project Management Office (PMO) under IT managed services (ITWorks), ensuring seamless technical and operational transition to the corporate EHR instance and associated clinical workflows for new hospital acquisitions. The team also directed all other large implementations, ensuring successful, on-time implementation and adoption.
• Co-directed ‘Mission Expansion’ initiatives as a core member of the Cerner leadership team, ensuring EHR alignment for client acquisitions and partnerships.

Foundational Healthcare IT Leadership | Adventist Health

Progressive leadership roles culminating in Clinical Information Systems Manager:

• EHR Implementation: Orchestrated four successful “big bang” EHR implementations across 20+ hospitals with zero downtime, ensuring 100% regulatory compliance and workflow alignment.
• Departmental Scaling: Built the enterprise clinical education department from a single educator to a high-performing 10-member team; authored curricula used by 400+ clinics.
• Workflow Optimization: Led cross-functional teams in mapping clinical workflows for large-scale deployments, consistently meeting technical and operational performance metrics.