What You Should Know:
– A June 2025 report from KLAS Research, titled “Executive Voices 2025,” provides insights from C-suite leaders in enterprise, operational/technological, and clinical roles to help technology vendors better understand their needs and challenges. While healthcare organizations rely on technology, many software vendors struggle to grasp the broader goals of the executives making purchasing decisions.
– Insights for the report were gathered from two KLAS data sources between May 2024 and May 2025. The report aims to amplify the provider’s voice, detailing what leaders are working toward, their obstacles, and how vendors can offer better support.
Overarching Challenges: Internal Alignment and Cost Sensitivity
The report identifies two primary themes that consistently emerged from interviews with executives: the critical need for internal alignment and pervasive sensitivity to cost. Technological success is increasingly dependent on alignment between IT, clinical, operational, and financial leaders. C-suite leaders report that well-designed solutions often fail when only one department’s needs are considered. The lack of adequate clinical input in many system decisions results in inefficiency and frustration. Internal alignment is no longer a “nice-to-have” but the primary differentiator between successful technology adoption and organizational resistance.
Top alignment challenges mentioned by C-suite leaders include:
- Misaligned technology strategy (29%)
- Inconsistent deployments (25%)
- Lack of clinical input (15%)
- Disagreement among leadership (14%)
- Siloed departments (12%)
- Lack of shared goals (10%)
Cost Concerns Dominate Executive Decisions
For executives in enterprise leadership and operational/technological roles, cost is a dominant theme. CFOs are deterred by vendors with unclear pricing models, while CEOs cite unexpected charges as a reason for switching vendors. CIOs and COOs express frustration with inflexible cost structures that delay critical upgrades. Across all roles, cost transparency is viewed as a test of a vendor’s integrity. Vendors who present clear pricing and flexible packages are significantly more likely to build lasting trust.
Leadership Insights: Priorities by Role
The report breaks down the specific needs, goals, and frustrations for key executive roles across the C-suite.
Enterprise Leadership Roles
- CEO/President: CEOs are focused on financial performance, system growth, and clinician retention. They favor vendors who can connect IT investments to big-picture goals, deliver on promises, and improve the system’s reputation. Aware that physician and nurse burnout is an enterprise risk, they see technology that improves morale as directly tied to success.
- CFO (Chief Financial Officer): CFOs prioritize financial predictability and long-term sustainability. They have a pragmatic approach, valuing vendors that simplify cost modeling and are deterred by those who introduce surprise fees or complicate ROI tracking. They often initiate vendor replacements due to opaque pricing models, hidden fees, or rigid bundles.
- CDO (Chief Data Officer): As enterprise unifiers of data, CDOs prioritize long-term architectural flexibility, robust integration, and the reduction of data silos. They are highly critical of platforms that trap data in silos and expect solutions to be interoperable and API-friendly.
Operational/Technological Roles
- CIO (Chief Information Officer): CIOs are tasked with aligning technology strategy with enterprise goals while managing vendor ecosystems and ensuring performance. They have a dual focus on visionary leadership and pragmatic control over implementation and cost. They favor platforms that support organizational transformation while remaining operationally reliable.
- CISO (Chief Security Officer): CISOs manage cybersecurity risks and are the gatekeepers of digital risk, with their influence on buying decisions growing rapidly. They prioritize proactive security measures, including zero-trust principles and end-to-end encryption, and often advocate for replacing a vendor that fails to meet modern security expectations.
- COO (Chief Operating Officer): Focused on throughput and system performance, COOs evaluate solutions tied to logistics, capacity management, and efficiency. They want tools that allow them to measure and monitor every aspect of service delivery, preferably with real-time dashboards and configurable alerts.
- CTO (Chief Technology Officer): As the strategic guardians of healthcare infrastructure, CTOs focus on building agile and scalable environments. They are skeptical of locked-down platforms and strongly advocate for open systems, modern architecture, and transparent, future-proof designs.
Clinical Roles
- CMO/CMIO (Chief Medical Officer/Chief Medical Information Officer): Serving as the link between clinical care and IT, CMOs and CMIOS champion the physician experience. Their decisions are based on how well technology elevates patient care while reducing provider friction. They frequently advocate for replacing systems that generate physician burnout.
- CNO/CNIO (Chief Nursing Officer/Chief Nursing Information Officer): Representing the largest clinical workforce, CNOs and CNIOs seek to create environments where nurses can provide safe and efficient care without being burdened by documentation. They are concerned with usability and alert fatigue and pursue replacements for platforms that require extra clicks or duplicative work. Mobile-first and context-aware designs are especially favored.
