“Prove them right.” This was how Greg Hughes, Executive Vice President, Communications, NBC Sports responded when I asked him about his career success. Greg…
Healthcare leaders need a path forward, and they need it now. Workforce churn, AI acceleration, payer pressure, policy shifts and other factors are converging in…
How much impact does leadership inexperience have on your organization? I feel the sleeping giant today in terms of operational excellence is the number…
Healthcare feels different now—because it is. Workforces are smaller, demand is rising, and culture expectations have changed. In a recent episode of the Healthcare…
Emergency department volumes are up. Patient complexity is rising. And care teams are often newer, stretched, and carrying more emotional load than ever before.…
Healthcare doesn’t need a fresh start—it needs a thoughtful rewire. Rewiring Healthcare: Foundation to Future brings together senior leaders to step back…
When it comes to learning, technology can be very helpful. But we can’t put so much emphasis on tech that we stop learning from others in our field. We win on ideas and what we can learn from each other. We need to be lifelong learners—and it’s important to go to where ideas are flowing in our industry. Yes, reading and listening are big parts of lifelong learning. That means books, blogs, articles, and podcasts both in…
What does it look like to truly rewire healthcare culture from the inside out? At NorthBay Health, it looks like focusing on trust, ownership, and leadership at every level. In a recent Healthcare Plus Podcast episode, Quint Studer spoke with two leaders from NorthBay: Dr. Heather Resseger, senior vice president, chief hospital operations officer, and chief nursing officer, and Jonna Taylor, recently promoted to director of acute care services. The podcast explores how NorthBay helped shape a…
I read an article on performance improvement plans (PIPs). It got me thinking about how companies can better approach employee performance. When a person in a workplace is not achieving outcomes, they are placed on a performance improvement plan. The PIP includes details on performance shortfalls and actions the person is expected to improve. It ensures that the supervisor is documenting issues and that the person is aware of the outcomes needed if they’re to…
I spend time with organizations that are investing in people. At each session, I ask, “How many have been in a supervisory role (manager, leader) for less than four years?” The percentage of hands that go up ranges from 30 to 60 percent. Next, I ask the group to reflect on their personal journey to a supervisory role. Did they get a degree in how to lead people before they were put in a leadership role?…
Are you a nice leader or a kind leader? Is there a difference? Yes, an important one. Nice and kind are not synonyms. Niceness is about seeming pleasant and agreeable. It’s about keeping the peace and making people comfortable. This is not a bad thing in many situations. Kindness is about real compassion and empathy. It’s taking action from the place of wanting the best for a person or an organization, even when it means telling hard truths and making…
Data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics suggests the number of jobs a person will have during their lifetime is 12. That’s a lot of resignations. How one leaves a job says much about a person. For a person who is paid hourly, it is normal to provide the employer a two-week notice. For someone in a salaried position, the length of the notice is often 30 days. When a person accepts a new job, they tend to be…
Clarity is key in building and sustaining a high-performing culture. For leaders, this means making sure messages are clear and understood—not ambiguous or confusing—and that everyone knows what they’re supposed to do and how it contributes to the organization’s objectives. Clarity is vital in each part of the organization, and it applies to everyone. (Here, I am talking about clarity as it relates to the workplace. However, the principles certainly apply to life in general.) Peter…
Never, never, never give up. This quote is associated with Winston Churchill, based on his famous speech delivered during World War II. It is often used to inspire people to persevere, to hold the line, to refuse to quit no matter what—in other words, to display grit. It is a great quote. But when I started digging deeper, I found it’s actually a shortened version of what Churchill really said: “Never give in. Never give…
Employee engagement is discussed and written about often. What does engagement look like in action? People who work in healthcare have great intentions. They care deeply about their patients and want the best outcomes for them and for the organization. Due to the industry’s being hyper-specialized, people can naturally be so focused on their own responsibilities that they may not see opportunities to make the patient’s experience even better. When leaders narrate how to truly…
My wife, Rishy, and I are owners of the Beloit Sky Carp baseball team, the high-A minor league affiliate of the Miami Marlins. I received a nice note from an employee saying they liked that I had ended an email with the words “gung ho!” I replied with a group message explaining a little more about the term and how it sums up what we want in the Sky Carp culture: an enthusiastic atmosphere created…