At Sarasota Memorial Hospital, a picture - or rather 30 minutes worth of pictures on video - was worth more than all the words in the typical institutional annual report.
The award-winning video, produced to document the Florida hospital's medical and financial accomplishments in fiscal year 1994-95, was a success among certain members of the not-for-profit 855-bed hospital and community at large. It also received a Silver 1995 Touchstone Award from the American Society of Healthcare Marketing and PR.
But, advises Donna Burtanger, director, communications and public affairs, producing an annual report on video will not completely eliminate the need for a printed supplement used to record more detailed financial information.
The hospital's department of communications tried out other formats for their annual report before attempting a video version. For the fiscal year 1991-92, the department created an eight-page insert for the Sarasota Herald Tribune, at a cost of $25,000.
The following year, the hospital took out two full pages, side by side in the Tribune, at an initial cost of $18,000. Those costs quickly escalated when they had to spend another $11,000 to create enough reprints for those who requested them.
Burtanger was betting that because Sarasota had only one newspaper in town, and most of the community - older adults and retirees - subscribed, the newspaper versions would reach many people. She quickly learned the downside of the newspaper approach.
With the two-page ad, "We realized we were only reaching people who got the Sunday paper, and they had to fumble through all the clutter to get to the information," said Burtanger. "We are always scrutinized by how we spend our money, and, with rising paper costs, and dwindling newspaper subscriptions, we realized this was not the way to reach an audience."
Additionally, the financial community - including bankers and legislators - were especially underwhelmed with the presentation, a community critical to a hospital as it seeks to borrow money or renew its bonds.
Drug and medical equipment companies in the process of trying to decide where to run tests of their products always ask to see a hospital's annual report, and the newspaper versions were less than convincing, said Burtanger.
A third try a year later had the hospital devote an issue of a hospital quarterly, "Contact," to the annual report, at a cost of $18,000.
"It was a nice piece but people didn't understand that it was our annual report," said Burtanger. "[The financial community] got stories - it was very narrative. The [financial] information they needed was there, but it was hard to find."
The difficulty and challenge of the annual report are that it is a document that must satisfy so many different constituents in the community. This is especially the case for a public hospital that interpreted the annual report as a responsibility to inform taxpayers regarding how the hospital is run, the medical and financial community and the consumers who use the hospital.
That's when the idea for a video came into the picture.
"In my desire to create a piece that met the needs of a diverse audience, was cost-efficient and would get memorable information to that audience, there's nothing like the power of television to get people to see what the hospital is all about," said Burtanger.
The hospital hired an outside production company, Columbus, Ohio-based Mills/James Productions, and spent $50,000 to produce a documentary-style video that focused on four areas within the hospital: recent accomplishments in the area of open heart surgery; the story of a tiny baby born in its maternal/infant area that had attracted international media attention; community benefits and volunteers; and technological advances.
In between those four segments, which featured doctors, patients and hospital staffers, financial information was presented, amplified with charts and graphs. A transcript of the video was also made available.
"The video had to be entertaining, too, and we accomplished that by including as many human interest stories as we could," said Matt McCandlish, producer/director. "We wanted to give it a human perspective to go with all those facts and numbers."
Additionally, Burtanger spent $9,000 and purchased three 30-minute segments on the local ABC affiliate in order to air the annual report during three different viewing times: a weekday evening, a Sunday morning, and a Saturday afternoon. Copies of the video were also placed in local libraries.
When the video, entitled, "Reflections of Life," was initially shown to more than 300 hospital managers, "they laughed, cried, stood up and gave themselves a standing ovation. I haven't since been able to generate that feeling of pride in-house with any other tool."
Burtanger estimates that the video reached 80% of the hospital's target market, and was produced at a lower cost than most annual reports. And, the video served dual purposes, such as showing it to outside groups, at orientation for new employees - the hospital CEO Michael Covert even toted a copy to a meeting of healthcare execs.
"The video made our institution very real to our community, and they were able to visualize the changes and successes that we had," said Covert.
Still, certain constituents were not entirely satisfied with the new format.
"My board members [nine publicly elected, non-paid positions] were not happy," said Burtanger. "One said, where's my name, where's my face?" Ordinarily, board members photos and credentials are featured in the traditional annual report format.
Covert confirmed that there was some frustration with the video, but vowed to use it again.
"If we had to do it all over again, I would do a companion [printed] piece with it," said Covert. "If you were a finance person or board member, you didn't have printed material in your hands and it was frustrating."
Burtanger said she would include board members in the credits of the upcoming video version of this year's annual report.
And, staffers in the finance department complained that there was not enough detailed financial information in the video, which forced them to develop additional material as needed.
"Next time, I would work more closely with senior directors to find out exactly what they needed, and create a more detailed transcript to accompany the video," she said. "The keys to a successful annual report survey [in any format] is surveying directors for input, follow through and make sure they proof it. And remember who your audience is." (Donna Burtanger, Michael Covert, Sarasota Memorial, 941/917-2444; Matt McCandlish,614/777-9933)