How Altru modernized staffing and integrated ShiftWizard in 10 weeks

“It’s very user-friendly and once they’re in, they understand it. They know how to use it. It’s pretty self-explanatory for them.”
— Kate Nygaard, Administrative Secretary, Altru Health System

In early 2024, Altru Health System faced a complex challenge: implement a new enterprise scheduling platform that integrated with Workday—and do it in less than three months.

This was no small task. Altru is a 226-bed community hospital, Level II trauma center, and regional teaching facility headquartered in Grand Forks, North Dakota, with about 4,000 employees serving a large rural population. The implementation window coincided with the hospital’s move into a new facility and ongoing service expansion, including behavioral health growth and the planned acquisition of a critical access hospital.

Three leaders—Nessa LeQuire, Practice Manager; Kate Nygaard, Administrative Secretary; and Lexy Lind, Lead Scheduling Associate—took on the responsibility for implementing ShiftWizard from HealthStream. Together, they led a high-intensity, high-impact scheduling transformation across inpatient, surgical, and procedural areas.

A clear mandate: Integration and usability

Altru had recently adopted Workday and needed a scheduling platform that would integrate seamlessly with its HR and payroll systems. “We were looking for something that would work with Workday… so we could have the shifts going back and forth and time and accounting-wise, and new employees coming into ShiftWizard,” said Kate Nygaard.

Usability for frontline teams was also key. “It did look like it would be easier for our staff to catch on and to use than Web Scheduler and ANSOS,” she added.

Accelerated implementation, anchored by a focused team

Training to build the system began on March 24. Go-live was scheduled for—and achieved on—June 1. That gave the team fewer than 11 weeks to design, build, test, and launch a mission-critical scheduling solution for thousands of employees.

“Basically two and a half months to get everything up and running and trained,” said Kate Nygaard.

They pulled it off. With leadership support, the core team was given the time and space to focus fully on execution. “My director took over all of my other work… so that I could specifically just work on this project… we were lucky, we had supportive leadership,” said Nessa LeQuire.

While the data conversion from ANSOS required more manual work than expected, the team used it as an opportunity to rethink how units and schedules were structured. “We had 168 units that we needed to manually create ourselves… but we really learned a lot about the system that way,” said Lexy Lind. (paraphrased) The experience gave the team deep configuration knowledge and ownership over the final build.

New capabilities, fast adoption

Despite the fast timeline, frontline teams adapted quickly—helped by familiar, mobile-friendly features and single sign-on functionality.

“We are the first facility that went on to the single sign-on… once [staff] figured out how they were able to get in and look at their schedule—self-scheduling, leaving messages for other staff members, switching shifts—they’ve gotten a lot in this program that helps them a lot,” said Kate Nygaard.

Lexy Lind echoed that sentiment: “We can text straight off of the program, which is super helpful… self-scheduling is very easy for the employees, and the PTO from Workday… flows in very nicely and takes out the shifts.”

ShiftWizard replaced a legacy scheduling system with a modern, centralized platform that streamlined operations and reduced administrative work for managers and staff.

Results: Stabilization, control, and transparency

The system stabilized quickly after launch. “It was maybe three to four weeks where we had some initial challenges and pretty much it’s been fairly smooth sailing since then… Overall I think ShiftWizard is a great product that serves our inpatient world well,” said Nessa LeQuire.

Staff gained greater autonomy and managers gained clearer visibility into staffing levels, requests, and time-off synchronization. The team continues to discover new efficiencies and reporting features months after go-live. “Even 14 months later, we’re still learning some of the stuff that ShiftWizard can do,” Nessa said.

Practical insight: Building smarter the next time

While the rollout succeeded, the team surfaced valuable lessons that would improve future implementations:

• Choose the right template length. An eight-week master schedule made it harder to accommodate every-third-weekend rotations. “If you have both every-other-weekend and every-third-weekend rotations, you either have to use a six-week template… or a 12-week template…” said Nessa LeQuire.
• Plan for depth of effort. Even with a system that simplifies scheduling, building from scratch takes time. “120 hours a week divided by three people” was how she described their team’s investment.
• Build a distributed support model. “There cannot be one super user. There needs to be several,” said Lexy Lind.

Strategic outcomes: A foundation for scalable growth

Altru’s inpatient, surgical, and procedural areas now run on a single scheduling platform integrated with Workday. Ambulatory clinics remain a future opportunity, with the team already engaged in HealthStream-led feedback groups and enhancement discussions.

More broadly, ShiftWizard now supports the health system’s ongoing growth. “We’re acquiring a critical access hospital in Devils Lake… and we just received funding from the state of North Dakota for a $10 million expansion of our behavioral health services,” said Nessa LeQuire.

This implementation shows what’s possible when focus, leadership support, and purpose-built tools align. ShiftWizard didn’t just replace an aging platform—it gave Altru new control over staffing, better access for employees, and a scalable foundation for what’s next.