barbara@wildblackberrystudio.com

At ClaimsBridge, we pride ourselves on our close-knit community and the dedication of our team members. Today, we’re shining a spotlight on one of our long-time employees, Melissa Barrios, who has been instrumental in our growth and success. Melissa has held many roles during her time at ClaimsBridge and is currently HR Administrator. Melissa has been with ClaimsBridge for over 16 years

What initially attracted you to join our company, and what has made you stay?

The opportunity for growth! 16 years later I feel as though I am a testament to the great opportunity for growth within our company. The evolution of our company is what has attracted me to stay. There has been continuous growth and change for the good. It has been very cool to see where we started to where we are now and have had the honor to be here for the journey.

How would you describe the work-life balance at our company? What support or resources have you received to help maintain that balance?

Understanding and accommodating is how I would best describe it. We all understand our roles, responsibilities, and dedication to a successful and productive work week, but we are all very aligned when it comes to the importance of family life and employees’ lives outside of the office. I had my first child in 2020 and I was able to work out a slight change in work hours and a hybrid work schedule with our leadership team. This was beneficial not only for the timeliness of pick up and drop off schedule, but also because the time I would have usually been traveling on my commute, could now be spent with my family. More recently with the collapse of the Key Bridge, a few employees were affected by their commute, including myself. Taking into account the much longer commute, my in-office hours were quickly adjusted.

” Our company has dedicated time and resources to not only making sure our work environment is a place where we feel comfortable, but a place where we are inspired to grow along with it.”

Can you describe your most significant achievement or project during your time at the company and how it impacted the organization?

It is hard to pick one, but the revamp of our contract was not only an achievement but also probably my favorite project. I was assigned the task of restructuring our Master Services Agreement back in 2022. Prior to this, our contract was 4-5 separate documents which all needed to be reviewed and signed off on by each new prospect. I redesigned the document and consolidated all the legal language as well as product pricing into one single document. This not only made the sales process more seamless and efficient, but it also helped the finance department easily identify and build the items for billing.

How has your role evolved since you joined the company, and what steps have you taken to adapt to those changes?

I started out working in our mailroom. Opening claims, answering customer support calls, and day to day tasks like filing and shredding. During my time at ClaimsBridge I have gained a wealth of knowledge about the company and every aspect of each department. With that type of knowledge and tenure, I’ve been deemed the title of Swiss Army Knife. Easily being able to jump in to act as a liaison for finance, sales, operations, and even back to my roots, the mailroom. In my latest role as HR Administrator, I’ve taken advantage of our employee education reimbursement policy and enrolled in the Society of Human Resources Management course in hopes to gain my SHRM-CP this summer.

How do you think our company’s culture and values impact the way we work and make decisions?

Our company has dedicated time and resources to not only making sure our work environment is a place where we feel comfortable, but a place where we are inspired to grow along with it. We involve employees in big decisions. Genuinely taking into consideration their thoughts and ideas.

Anything else you’d like to share?

If you would have asked me at the age of 18 when I first started working for this company, where I thought I would be now…I never would have thought I would be here. In a position where I work with wonderful people, who work so hard and well together as a team, and have a career that I am very proud of and love.

We are excited to announce that ClaimsBridge has successfully achieved SOC 2 compliance certification, marking a significant step in our commitment to the security, privacy, and integrity of our clients’ data.

Kevin Gibson, CEO of ClaimsBridge, emphasized the importance of this certification: “Achieving SOC 2 certification is not just a milestone—it’s a testament to our dedication to the highest standards of data security and privacy for our customers. We recognize the importance of protecting sensitive information, and this achievement solidifies the trust our customers place in us.”

In the face of increasingly sophisticated cyber threats, particularly within the healthcare industry, ClaimsBridge has taken proactive steps to ensure robust cybersecurity measures are in place. The SOC 2 compliance confirms that ClaimsBridge adheres to rigorous security protocols necessary to protect healthcare data from unauthorized access and breaches.

Jason Werner, Chief Information Officer, highlighted the technical excellence behind this achievement: “Our engineering team has worked diligently to implement comprehensive security measures. SOC 2 certification reassures our customers that we provide a secure and trusted platform for healthcare claims management, maintaining data privacy, confidentiality, and availability at every operational level.”

SOC 2 compliance involves strict adherence to established security and operational criteria, including the management of data security, availability, processing integrity, confidentiality, and privacy. This certification demonstrates that ClaimsBridge has robust policies and procedures to effectively safeguard sensitive information.

This certification reaffirms that our longstanding practices and procedures have consistently aligned with key regulatory standards such as HIPAA, ensuring that we manage data according to industry best practices and legal requirements.

The journey to achieving SOC 2 compliance involved meticulous planning, continuous monitoring, and improvement of our processes. Simon Cooper, IT Development Manager, noted, “This certification involved comprehensive planning and ongoing enhancement of our internal controls to meet the stringent standards required to protect customer information.”

For more information about our SOC 2 compliance or our services, please contact us today. We are here to assist you in navigating the complex landscape of data security with confidence and integrity.

At ClaimsBridge, we pride ourselves on our close-knit community and the dedication of our team members. Today, we’re shining a spotlight on one of our newest employees, Simon Cooper, who is leading some important initiatives for our team and our clients. Simon is our Healthcare IT Development Manager at ClaimsBridge.  He brings over 20 years of passion for creating and delivering innovative SaaS products that solve customer problems and drive revenue growth and puts that to work for clients and team members alike.

Q: What initially attracted you to join ClaimsBridge and what has made you stay?

Several things. From my point of view, I wanted to join a growing company that was doing something interesting in technology, would be a good fit for my experience, and a more technical, hands-on role

But I also wanted it to be very specific to my location. Having commuted around the Washington DC beltway for 10 years I knew I didn’t want to do that again. And then having worked at home fully remote for several years, I realized it’d be nice to go into an office every once in a while, rather than being fully remote.

I was kind of looking for something that was blended, that had all those attributes.

The Healthcare IT Development Manager role popped up at ClaimsBridge and it seemed it was a good fit.

When I came in to interview and had time to speak with Jason and Kevin and really learn more about the role, the company, and the culture, it became really apparent to me that this would be a great fit and it was exactly what I was looking for.

I could also see that it was going to be a very interesting role. It’s a small company with that start up feel even though they’ve been in business for 20 years. ClaimsBridge has got that on the cusp of great things feeling and you can see the growth potential. You can see how the business and technology is evolving.

These are all things I’m interested in and love getting involved with those kinds of challenges, solving the problems of a smaller company trying to grow and become a larger enterprise player.

Q: How would you describe the work-life balance at Claims Bridge?

I would say ClaimsBridge definitely sees balance as a very important aspect of life. They’re very respectful and supportive of work-life balance.

There’s a real culture of not disturbing people when they’re on vacation, not creating deadline stress, and checking that workloads are manageable. I’ve worked previously at companies where you were expected to be available almost 24-7, working across multiple time zones and countries. It’s just go-go-go all the time. This is much more relaxed, and straightforward.

Of course, there are deadlines to meet and there are urgent priorities to tackle, but we’ve got time to do it, and time to plan not just react.

Q: Are there any specific support or resources that you’ve received help with to help you specifically maintain balance?

I think it’s just the overall support from the leadership team, they’ve clearly set out their expectations of how they want the company to work and how they want to support people in their roles. An open-door policy where you can discuss any challenges you have with your role, or work life balance with managers and leadership is excellent.

Q: Can you describe your most significant achievement or project so far and talk a little bit about how it’s impacted the organization?

Coming in as a new starter, half my time was trying to learn about the business, customers, and technology. The other half of my time was executing the SOC 2 compliance project, that I could really dig into and take ownership of.

Having completed all the items required for a SOC 2 compliance we completed our three-month audit period with the official third-party SOC 2 auditor going through all of our policies, procedures, standards and all of the evidence based data that we’ve put out in a data room for them.

We’ve received our SOC 2 compliance report and achieved certification. This will help the company prove to our existing customers as well as new potential prospects that we are a quality focused organization that securely manages our clients’ data and our software to the SOC 2 standards.

Q: How has your role evolved since you joined the company?

Given it is a fairly new role, it hasn’t evolved specifically since joining the company. However, the role has allowed me to work on a wide variety of projects.

Although, I’m responsible for the IT and the development team’s day to day operations, I’m also getting involved in other things to improve processes or tooling, such as implementing Azure DevOps to help manage the software development lifecycle.

Integrating that with our existing software platforms that we use here at ClaimsBridge to manage our client projects and product roadmap., I’m currently looking at not only how we enhance our security posture, by how we physically secure our resources, clients’ data and our locations to protect against those threats that are always present in the world of cybersecurity.

I get to work on these different varied projects, where one day it could be doing some software development and writing code. The next day it could be documenting processes or working on IT hardware. Variation keeps the job fresh and interesting day to day, week to week.

“It’s a small company with that start up feel even though they’ve been in business for 20 years.”

Q: How do you think ClaimsBridge’s culture and values impact the way the organization works and makes decisions?

I think the culture is very supportive of the individual.

Everyone’s respected. Everyone’s opinion is listened to. You really feel like you’re being heard as well. And there’s also a level of autonomy that they’ve built into the culture which frees people to go off and make decisions and get on with things.

We’re not bound by having lots of management structure and many layers of approval to get things done. We do have some specific approvals to help manage quality control and things like that, of course. But outside of that, we’re a pretty nimble organization. We can really turn things out quickly and move from one priority to another priority very easily.

Q: Is there anything else you’d like to share or anything that you would say to someone who’s thinking about coming to work at ClaimsBridge?

If you’re considering a job with ClaimsBridge, this is a great place to work. I think it really has the feel of a family-owned business and a startup, but it’s a 20+ year old company.

It truly feels like you’re joining the family. It’s a diverse group of individuals with lots of different experiences and backgrounds.

It’s also a really interesting place to work with new initiative and client projects happening all the time.

We recently had the opportunity to chat with Jeff Penn, Vice President of Business Development at ClaimsBridge, to uncover his unique journey with the company and explore what makes ClaimsBridge an exceptional place to work. Jeff’s story is one where freedom and growth is supported by the ClaimsBridge culture of collaboration and creativity from the bedrock of a thriving work environment.

Q: What initially attracted you to join our company, and what has made you stay?

It’s definitely the people; folks like Bob Schmidt, Mike Tosti. Mike was the real catalyst behind it all. We’ve worked together in the past and he’d had a great experience with ClaimsBridge. And the fact is their portfolio was attractive. It was clear that I had the ability to enhance it, which we’ve done. So those were the primary factors: simply relationships and product portfolio.

Q: Work-life balance is crucial. How would you describe it at ClaimsBridge?

We work from home, so it’s an ideal scenario.  I work constantly because that’s how I’m wired, but I can take breaks. I have a really nice set of trails right at the back door here, so if I want to go grab a quick 30-minute bike, I can do that.  It’s a mountain bike ride, so I get a good pump in 30 minutes and I come back energized for the rest of the day. Kevin Gibson as a CEO is very, very people-oriented, which is good and that’s a great culture to be in.

“The culture embraces ideas, assertiveness, and creativity. I’ve got the keys and I’m free to drive my ideas.”

Q: Can you describe your most significant achievement or project during your time at the company and how it impacted the organization?

It’s distribution and expansion of the product portfolio which encompasses our Connect Services, High Performance Networks, RBP platform and Blue Cross networks. We offer the most unique product portfolio in the industry which has enabled significant growth, and we are tracking to escalate revenues dramatically this year once again.

Q: How has your role evolved since you joined the company, and what steps have you taken to adapt to those changes?

I spearheaded efforts to increase our visibility in the TPA area and helped to enhance the product portfolio. We have seen dramatic revenue growth as a result.  Health systems sponsoring direct-to-employer initiative (D2E) and direct contracting by self-funded employers/TPAs is a trend and we have the ideal solution to ensure success for all parties. Our RBP platform is incredibly unique and has demonstrated substantial savings.

Q: How do you think our company’s culture and values impact the way we work and make decisions?

The culture embraces ideas, assertiveness and creativity. I’ve got the keys and I’m free to drive my ideas. It’s a positive culture, a great group of people in all departments, a warm atmosphere.

At ClaimsBridge, we pride ourselves on our close-knit community and the dedication of our team members. Today, we’re shining a spotlight on one of our long-standing employees, Sean Grimes, who has been instrumental in our growth and success. Sean is a Senior Technical Analyst who creates and maintains our reporting database and user interfaces for ClaimsBridge software solutions. Sean has been with ClaimsBridge for over 9 years.

Why ClaimsBridge?

When asked about how he came to ClaimsBridge, Sean shared a story of small company charm and the allure of a family-like atmosphere. Initially introduced to the company by a former colleague, he was drawn to the relaxed environment and the comfortable atmosphere. “It’s always wonderful to have a casual and relaxed environment. For example, our team can wear casual clothes to the office. I feel I can be more productive and focused when I am working in a comfortable environment,” he shared.

One of his first impressions of the company was shaped by a candid conversation with Bob, the former CEO. His genuine interest in his aspirations and the company’s close-knit nature made him feel right at home. The opportunity to juggle multiple roles and delve into different areas of the company was a significant pull, ensuring no day was monotonous.

“Everybody helps to make the company profitable and move forward. It’s great that we have a common understanding of our goals.”

Work-Life Balance at ClaimsBridge

Sean describes the work-life balance as a blend of challenges and rewards. While there are times when the workload demands extra hours, the company’s understanding nature ensures employees can take breaks when needed. “Everybody helps to make the company profitable and move forward. It’s great that we have a common understanding of our goals,” he noted.

The company’s culture promotes mutual support. Whether it’s covering for a colleague or stepping in to assist with a project, the team always has each other’s backs. This collaborative spirit, combined with management’s genuine care for employees’ well-being, fosters a balanced work environment.

Achievements and Growth

One of Sean’s most significant achievements was revamping the scanning software used for converting paper claims to electronic format. This initiative streamlined the process, enhancing efficiency and reducing manual intervention. “It enabled the mailroom department to significantly reduce the amount of time it took for them to handle the claims,” he stated. “It was an interesting project where I knew I could address the growing need with automating technology and optimized processes. It was really satisfying to know I was helping my colleagues with a very manual, slow, and tedious process.”

Over the years, Sean’s role has evolved, taking on more responsibilities, from training junior programmers to overseeing client implementations. The company’s rapid growth has presented challenges, but with a supportive team and a passion for learning, he has adeptly navigated these changes.

Company Culture and Values

ClaimsBridge’s culture is rooted in camaraderie and mutual respect. The open-door policy ensures everyone’s voice is heard and decisions are made with the company’s and employees’ best interests in mind. “You just get the feeling that nobody’s uptight; everybody’s approachable,” he emphasized.

The company’s growth, from processing 400,000 claims when he started to recently hitting the 100 million mark, is a testament to the team’s dedication and hard work.

Sean’s journey with ClaimsBridge is a testament to the company’s commitment to its values and its people. As we continue to grow and evolve, we remain grounded in our mission to provide a supportive environment where every team member can thrive.