Defense Health Agency: Integrating Five Legacy Organizations into Unified Operations
Honoring organizational histories while building unified future. Integration that brought people along rather than leaving them behind.
The Challenge
The newly established Defense Health Agency faced a monumental integration challenge: consolidating infrastructure projects and resources across five legacy management structures, each with distinct cultures, processes, systems, and decades of independent operation. Without integrated infrastructure operations, the agency risked duplicative efforts, resource conflicts, and inability to deliver cohesive health IT services across the Department of Defense. Flag Officer leadership needed clear visibility into transformation progress, risks, and strategic milestones, but the complexity of integration made transparency difficult to achieve.
Approach
Supported the organizational stand-up of the Defense Health Agency's Health IT Infrastructure & Operations Divisions. We:
Directed enterprise integration efforts spanning organizational design, process harmonization, and systems consolidation
Developed comprehensive service catalog that unified previously disparate service offerings
Led strategic planning that balanced integration urgency with organizational change realities
Provided regular executive briefings to Flag Officer–level leadership with transparent reporting on progress, risks, and decision points
Respected legacy strengths while driving toward unified operations, honoring what each organization brought while creating something new
Our approach balanced the urgency of consolidation with the human reality of organizational change recognizing that you can't mandate culture change, you have to build it.
The Outcomes
Successfully consolidated infrastructure projects and resources across five legacy organizations into unified divisions
Established integrated Health IT Infrastructure & Operations Divisions with clear structure and accountability
Developed comprehensive service catalog enabling unified service delivery across DoD
Provided Flag Officer leadership with transparent visibility into transformation risks, progress, and strategic decisions
Created foundation for sustainable, enterprise-wide health IT operations serving military healthcare mission
Four Principles That Drive Every Engagement
Across sectors and organizational contexts, Fox & Rain brings a consistent approach:
We start with the people, not the technology. Transformation succeeds when organizations build capability, not just implement solutions.
We navigate complexity without creating overwhelm. Our frameworks bring clarity to messy situations.
We build consensus across diverse stakeholders. Alignment is facilitated through transparent dialogue and evidence-based decision-making.
We deliver outcomes that last. Our work creates sustainable change and results that last.
Ready to Write Your Own Success Story?
Whether you're navigating multi-stakeholder complexity, leading enterprise transformation, or building organizational capability for sustained change, Fox & Rain brings 20+ years of experience turning strategic vision into operational reality.