Mayo’s Bhaskaran Outlines Playbook for Making Tech “Stick”

In a wide-ranging discussion on adoption, governance and the pace of innovation, Edwina Bhaskaran, Chief Clinical Systems and Informatics Officer, Mayo Clinic, outlined how large health systems can ensure new technology isn’t merely installed but actually used. Central to her approach is a “sticky” mindset—one that favors simple, timely, workflow-integrated tools that earn their keep with measurable outcomes for clinicians and patients.

Bhaskaran described “sticky” not as a rigid methodology but as a way of asking disciplined questions at every stage of the technology life cycle—from turning on a small feature to completing a major rollout and, eventually, deciding when to retire a tool. Rather than celebrate go-lives, she urged teams to evaluate whether a system is truly embedded in practice, producing adoption data that drives iterative refinement or a decision to sunset.

She emphasized that “sticky” success must be visible in both outcomes and experience. “We need to make sure that the return is worth the effort for the people by which we’re implementing the change, both from a clinical lens, but also from a patient lens.” That attention to yield, she said, should be paired with evidence that a tool is simple, timely and tightly tied to day-to-day workflows—conditions that keep usage from decaying after launch.

Training That Meets Clinicians Where They Are

Bhaskaran tied training strategy to the reality of scarce attention in modern care settings, arguing for a portfolio of learning modes—from short videos to classroom sessions, peer-to-peer demonstrations and “at-the-elbow” support—matched to a user’s role and the time each spends in the system. She framed the choice of training modes as an investment decision: organizations should scale up modalities when the expected yield (e.g., reduced burden, better outcomes, higher safety) justifies the cost, and pare back when changes are incremental.



Bhaskaran also stressed the power of peer influence and the importance of starting every education plan with a clear “why.” She noted that role-specific training, including for high-impact specialties, is often best calibrated by how much time those clinicians actually spend in the software, not just by their seniority or visibility, ensuring the right users receive deeper enablement while occasional users get efficient paths through the tasks they perform most.

Managing Change Fatigue and Culture

Bhaskaran called change fatigue real and recommended viewing it across the entire enterprise—not only IT programs but also non-IT changes like facility openings or operational restructurings. She advocated a living roadmap that categorizes upcoming work (enterprise-wide “mega” changes versus localized enhancements) and sequences efforts based on each unit’s capacity to absorb disruption.

She argued that durable adoption depends on culture more than on committee structure. In practice that means safe channels for departments to say when they are at a tipping point—and for IT and operations to recalibrate pace, bundle changes or even accelerate to get past an inflection. The guiding principle, she said, is that change should be done with clinicians, and that trust is earned when teams respond visibly to feedback.

Rationalizing the Portfolio, With Pilot Discipline

Bhaskaran is blunt about the downside of excess technology and the need to continually prune. “I’m a big fan of decommissioning. Love that word. I think we have to be brave enough to say, these tools are no longer meeting clinical needs. Let’s take it out.” Sustained adoption data, she noted, can reveal when upgrades have shifted workflows so that yesterday’s helpful tool is today’s clutter.

She warned against over-reliance on the “80/20” rule when consolidating applications across departments. “I’ve been burned by the 80/20 rule because oftentimes the 20% – depending on what we’re talking about – can be the m...