iPaaS Data Integration
Putting Data in Motion
Solution: iPaaS / Data Integration
Industry: Healthcare
Client: Telehealth & Telepsychiatry Services Provider
How Kenway Consulting Helped a Client Achieve Data Harmony by Automating the Free Exchange of Synchronized Data between Multiple Systems in Near Real-time
The Problem
On the heels of a merger to create the largest telepsychiatry provider in the United States, a telehealth services organization faced a common problem for modern businesses: the complexity of maintaining data across multiple systems. The newly formed organization utilized different software solutions for specific purposes in managing contacts, opportunities, and accounts. As a result, employees of the organization spent time manually replicating data attributes across systems. If a lead, for example, was generated via process automation in one system, a user would have to physically key the information associated with that record into a second system. The alternative was to not have a holistic view of the business or a complete lifecycle for any of its facets. Rather than live with the burdens of an inefficient procedure, the organization sought help in creating a streamlined and robotic flow of data between systems.
The Solution
To simplify the data landscape, preserve the integrity of the organization’s data, and reduce the manual data entry efforts of its employees, the business hired Kenway Consulting to help. Kenway built a plan to automate the synchronization of data across multiple systems to reduce the burden of manual data entry. When a record was created or modified in one system, it would trigger a process to automatically create or update the corresponding record in another. Additionally, data migration and synchronizations were planned and executed to ensure historical data was synchronized across platforms, and to reduce complexity and cost of data storage in redundant environments. Finally, the solution incorporated interface enhancements to various objects and fields within the system to enrich the user experience.
What Kenway Delivered
Adhering to the business requirements documented by the client, Kenway utilized the client’s existing data integration tool (Informatica) to create workflows that would provide a conduit between two systems.
Trigger Events Kick-Off
the Process
The requirements dictated specific events that would trigger the synchronization of data (for example, changing the phone number associated with the record). Kenway configured webhooks or workflow rules to recognize the trigger events and send outbound messages to the Informatica process target URLs to support the service calls needed. Those messages delivered a payload or identifier that allowed for the Informatica process to pass data associated with the source record to the corresponding target record.
Automated Data Synchronization
For each event, the process would comb the data set for records that needed synchronization and adjust any fields that were not aligned. In cases where the data needed to be normalized, the Informatica process required field-specific coding to map values to align with each other (e.g. “True” became “Yes” or “False” became “No”). The synchronization process also populated newly created ID fields from each system, so that future updates would identify the exact record without the need for best-guess searching logic. A second Informatica process would then pass data in the opposite direction, as needed.
Connections Across
Systems
The Informatica processes only work if there is a way to connect the processes to the systems being synchronized. To ensure swift and accurate processing, Kenway developed connectors to each service leveraging Informatica’s capabilities. The service connectors were developed to perform any of the GET, POST, or PUT actions required to synchronize data across the systems. Logic in the process workflows controlled which action to perform based upon the inputs received from each system.
The Result
“Speedy project delivery
Data that can be trusted
Automated data transfer
New bus. dev. enabled”
Michael Radford
Due to the capabilities of Informatica and a skilled consulting partner in Kenway, the telehealth organization was able to quickly move through requirements, development, and testing deployment, following the highest industry standards. The organization had confidence in deploying these integrations into production environments and now has a framework to be expanded upon or duplicated for additional systems or data objects as they are identified in the future. The new integrations transfer data automatically between systems, so employees are no longer plagued by the time constraints of having to replicate data entry and the possibility for human error. By automating the practice, the organization now has data that it can trust. Further, the synchronization expands on the organization’s ability to trace the lifecycle of contacts, accounts, and opportunities using newly created ID fields. Insights from this information open new possibilities for business development strategies and growth of their business.
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