Reinier de Graaf Hospital: Using OGSM to Drive Strategic Transformation in Healthcare
How a Dutch top-clinical hospital uses OGSM to navigate rising care demand, strengthen regional collaboration, and turn strategy into execution
1. Organization Profile
Reinier de Graaf Hospital is the oldest hospital in the Netherlands, with origins dating back to 1250. Today, it is a modern top-clinical care provider in Delft and part of the Reinier Haga Group, employing more than 3,000 professionals and serving a critical regional role.
2. The Challenge: Growing Healthcare Demand With a Fixed Workforce
Under the Dutch government’s Integral Healthcare Agreement (IZA), the total number of healthcare workers must not increase in the coming years. Meanwhile:
- Healthcare demand continues to rise.
- Hospitals face tough choices about what care to provide, where, and when.
- Transformation is essential — but complex and high-stakes.
For Reinier de Graaf, the recent consolidation of all hospital services under one roof created both urgency and opportunity for a new strategic direction.
According to CEO Carina Hilders, the hospital needed to reconnect with its historical roots in community-based care: solidarity, collaboration, and regional partnership.
3. Strategic Direction: Back to Community Care, Forward to Life-Course Medicine
After analysing regional healthcare trends, the hospital identified three strategic priorities:
Responding to Regional Care Needs
With a targeted focus on three high-growth domains:
- Elderly care
- Mother & child care
- Oncology
Delivering the Right Care in the Right Place
Evaluating which care must be delivered in the hospital — and which can be delivered by regional partners, GPs, home-care providers, midwives, or mental-health organisations.
Delivering the Right Care at the Right Time
Introducing life-course medicine: anticipating patient needs across different stages of life.
Example: children born with low birth weight have significantly higher risks of cardiovascular disease later in life — yet this knowledge is rarely translated into proactive, preventive care. Reinier de Graaf aims to change this.
4. The Core Question: How Do We Turn Strategy Into Real Change?
Like many healthcare organizations, Reinier de Graaf faced several barriers:
- Strategic plans remain abstract or “on paper.”
- Translating ambitions to clinical teams is difficult.
- Differences between units make shared progress hard to monitor.
- Large-scale change requires consistent direction and shared language.
The executive team concluded:
“We need a tool that provides direction — while still allowing flexibility.”
5. The Solution: OGSM as a Hospital-Wide Approach
Reinier de Graaf selected OGSM as the structure for defining and executing its new strategy.
Why OGSM?
According to Carina Hilders:
- Focus and clarity
OGSM forces the organisation to articulate its main Objective in one clear sentence. - Bottom-up engagement
Teams help shape the strategy from day one, creating ownership and relevance. - Steerability for executives and managers
OGSM shows whether goals are being achieved — and where resources or attention are needed. - One format across five care units
Aligns diverse teams and clarifies how each contributes to shared goals. - Professionalisation through continuous monitoring
OGSM encourages reflection, learning, and disciplined execution.
“OGSM is a guiding framework that still leaves room for our organisational character. Without action, there is no transformation — and OGSM helps make that action concrete.”
6. Implementation: One Strategy, Five Care Units
The hospital adopted a cascaded OGSM structure:
- A hospital-wide OGSM defining the overarching strategic direction.
- OGSMs for each of the five care units, aligned with the main strategy.
- Tailored Measures for each team based on their patient groups and workflows.
- Monthly monitoring and structured management reviews.
- OGSM as the foundation for prioritisation, decision-making, and progress tracking.
A key principle
Reinier de Graaf applies OGSM not as a rigid template but as a flexible, supportive framework:
- Oncology operates differently from mother-child care, and OGSM allows for those differences.
- Teams define their own actions and link them to the hospital’s broader strategic objectives.
7. Early Results
Although the transformation is multi-year, the organisation is already experiencing tangible benefits:
✔ Clear Strategy Alignment
All care units work within the same strategic structure, eliminating fragmented plans.
✔ Stronger Collaboration and Cross-Unit Learning
OGSM makes progress visible:
- Which units advance fastest
- Where teams can learn from each other
- Which areas require additional support
✔ Increased Professionalisation
Continuous monitoring leads to:
- Better decision-making
- More predictable progress
- Clearer accountability
✔ Higher Staff Engagement
Teams are involved early, making the strategy “theirs” and strengthening ownership.
8. Conclusion: OGSM as an Accelerator for Healthcare Transformation
The challenges in healthcare are too large for strategies that do not translate into action.
Reinier de Graaf demonstrates that OGSM:
- Brings focus and direction
- Aligns diverse teams
- Turns strategy into practical execution
- Creates transparency and shared learning
- Offers flexibility for complex care environments
OGSM is helping the organisation build the future of sustainable, regional healthcare.
9. Want to See What OGSM Can Do for Your Organisation?
This case study shows how OGSM can be a catalyst for strategy execution, even in highly complex environments like hospitals.
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