Turning a Complex Healthcare IT Portfolio Back into a Strategic Asset
A large healthcare provider stabilised a fragmented IT portfolio by resetting governance, rebuilding platform foundations and restoring executive confidence through disciplined, senior-led intervention.
Context
Operating across aged care, retirement living and in-home healthcare services, the organisation relied heavily on technology to support clinical, workforce and community outcomes. Over time, however, its IT portfolio had become increasingly unstable.
Leadership instability, fragmented system ownership and years of unmanaged technical debt had eroded confidence at every level. Competing platforms, including Microsoft, ServiceNow, HR and clinical systems, were being managed in isolation, creating internal conflict rather than enabling services.
Governance had effectively collapsed. The CIO was under sustained pressure, unable to justify investment or articulate a credible path forward to the Board. Technical platforms were expensive to run, difficult to manage and misaligned with the organisation’s actual needs.
Approach
This engagement focused on stabilising the environment, restoring trust and rebuilding the IT function as a governed, strategic capability.
Define
The first priority was clarity.
A comprehensive enterprise architecture blueprint was developed to establish a shared understanding of the current state and a credible future direction. This clearly defined the role of each major platform and resolved long-standing internal disputes over ownership and overlap.
At the same time, the true condition of the ServiceNow platform was surfaced. Years of unmanaged customisation and fragmented delivery had left the system fragile, expensive and misaligned with best practice.
Align
With the baseline established, remediation and alignment followed.
The ServiceNow platform was reset through a clean re-implementation, deliberately adhering to a zero-customisation, out-of-the-box model. Vendor contracts were reviewed and corrected, halting predatory commercial practices and restoring control over licensing and spend.
IT processes were redefined to align with business capabilities rather than systems, and this new approach was immediately applied to a critical HRIS procurement, ensuring lessons were embedded, not deferred.
To enable delivery within severe budget constraints, a tailored financing model was introduced, allowing remediation to proceed without additional short-term capital pressure.
Govern
Governance was rebuilt at the executive level.
Big House stepped into the governance gap, preparing board-level papers and executive briefings that translated technical remediation into clear, outcome-focused decisions. This restored Board confidence and provided leadership with a defensible, future-focused narrative for investment and change.
Ongoing assurance was embedded to support the organisation through stabilisation and transition.
Outcome
A failing portfolio was transformed into a governed, strategic asset.
Operational and financial risk was reduced, platform foundations were stabilised and internal capability was strengthened through targeted technical and non-technical training. Over a 12-month assurance period, the organisation regained confidence in its systems, processes and leadership direction.
Clear architectural boundaries between platforms ensured the right tools were used for the right purpose going forward. Most importantly, the IT function emerged credible, trusted and aligned to the organisation’s mission, supporting clinical and community outcomes rather than distracting from them.