HARVARD VANGUARD MEDICAL ASSOCIATES
Developing a Communications Plan from the Ground Up

Harvard Vanguard Medical Associates is a multi-specialty physician practice with many convenient locations in the greater Boston area. As an affiliate of Harvard Medical School, its physicians are on the staff of Boston's leading academic medical centers and community hospitals, including Brigham and Women's Hospital, Beth Israel Deaconess, and Children's Hospital. These physicians have been on the forefront of quality improvement in patient care for adults and children for more than three decades and continue to receive among the highest ratings for care quality in Massachusetts. Harvard Vanguard is an affiliate of Atrius Health.

Harvard Vanguard wanted to raise its visibility and develop grassroots community outreach, particularly through local and community media. The organization had never had a strategic communications plan and they hired SM& to create one and to work with the in-house marketing department. In creating this new plan, SM& also developed the organization’s standardized public relations protocols and procedures. After a communications audit, SM& determined that the media was interested in Harvard Vanguard’s story, whether about primary care, advanced electronic medical records, or how it competes with the highest-level hospitals for day-to-day care.

SM& Harvard Vanguard have been working together successfully for the past four years to develop news angles and create broader story ideas into which these topics and other standout programs can be woven. SM& created an experts’ bureau, leveraging Harvard Vanguard’s doctors as media sources for comment on breaking news. The SM& team prepares physicians for one-on-one interviews, conducts media training for health care executives, and handles press outreach for major announcements, such as a new cancer center, or health delivery innovation like shared medical appointments. As a result, Harvard Vanguard has raised its visibility considerably and achieved blanket coverage in the local and community media, where there had been none before. These efforts also succeeded in generating internal enthusiasm among Harvard Vanguard’s staff for building the organization’s brand recognition, inspiring them to become more effective advocates for their employers’ work.