Maria Todd establishes The Healthcare Reimbursement Institute, a new non-profit, online educational community. The Institute offers affordable online training by some of the nation's leading trainers. Todd has rallied her colleagues, many from the HFMA national circuit, as well as several recognized author colleagues and others who have great messages, tools, tips and techniques to share. HRI has adopted leading edge technology that enables us to offer high-quality programs at the very affordable price points.
A "zero tolerance" policy for infomercials
Todd is a fanatic about the educational quality and as Executive Director, all programming is personally reviewed by her and a content committee to ensure that programs are purely educational without commerical bias or message. In fact, speakers are required to pay "damages" to the Institute if they convert the teachable moment to an infomercial. Damages are calculated as the cost to market the program, the cost to conduct the program and 150% of each participants' registration fee as a refund to the registrant.
A different business model than other seminar sponsors.
Unlike many seminar sponsors who market webinars, HRI pay instructors for their presentation and does not require them to transfer ownership of their intellectual property as a "Work for Hire". Many seminar sponsors take advantage of inexperienced speakers that are just starting out by trading them an opportunity to gain exposure by speaking without compensation and often require the speaker to sign an agreement transferring ownership ot the intellectual property to the sponsor. Many of those companies also rebroadcast programs that are "in the can" and not interactive for the same price as the interactive program. "Apart from the cost of a duplicated CD or bandwidth to deliver the content online, the price paid is almost pure profit," says Todd. In most cases, the speaker receives no compensation or royalty for re-broadcasts and the attendee cannot ask questions of the presenter at the time their question comes up. "As an educator, I cannot support that. It is unfair to the speaker and the student. I won't begin to suggest that others should not have a right to their business model, it is just that HRI will not pursue that direction," says Todd. That being said, she has gained a humbling new appreciation for the intense staff dedication and commitment to produce educational programming as a non-profit membership association.
Grand opening slated for January 2009.
As a result, the grand opening of HRI is keeping Todd busy. She has been working to develop the website, learn the technology, and recruiting speakers and reviewing program content for a January 2009 Grand Opening. The website will host online community forums, scheduled thought leader-guided chats, webinars, and a bookstore. For more information, visit the HRI website to view course offerings, speaker bios, or to submit a program proposal. The website is under development and changes daily.
Scholarships for advanced studies. Once HRI is up and running, a scholarship fund will be established from registration proceeds after expenses. The scholarship awards will be available to anyone studying at an undergrad or graduate or post-graduate level in any area associated with healthcare reimbursement. HRI is very mission-driven. The management compensation is capped at three times that of the lowest paid staff member. HRI is very austere with expenditures.
Todd will serve as Executive Director for the remainder of 2008 and all of 2009 without compensation. She has also donated the use of web hosting, telephone lines and office space to HRI without reimbursement through 2009.
