Tending to Hospital Employees After the Joplin Tornado

On Sunday, May 22, a category EF5 tornado ripped like a buzz saw through Joplin, MO. Within minutes, at least 142 people were killed, hundreds were injured, and much of the town was destroyed, including the 367-bed St. John’s Mercy Regional Medical Center.

And just as quickly, the 2,200 employees at the gutted hospital faced the prospect of losing their jobs. That’s when Mercy Health System CEO Lynn Britton made the decision that may come to define his leadership at the system, which operates 30 hospitals in four states. Britton launched a talent-sharing program designed to keep as many Mercy workers as possible employed through the rebuilding effort.

Britton spoke with HealthLeaders Media recently about the decision, and the nearly $1 billion commitment that Mercy has made towards rebuilding Joplin’s healthcare infrastructure.

HLM: The decision to keep staff on the payroll was made just hours after the tornado struck. Why was that a priority?

Britton: “For a variety of reasons. With Hurricane Katrina, a lot of healthcare professionals who didn’t have a place to work tended to leave New Orleans to find work, and once the healthcare organizations were thinking through how to get back on their feet, there wasn’t a professional medical community to support them. So I absolutely didn’t want that to happen in Southwest Missouri. We felt it was critical that we kept everybody employed – but not just sitting on a sofa collecting a paycheck. They needed to be using their clinical skills and keeping them sharp to make sure the medical community was going to be there when the new hospital opened.”

“Then there is the economic side of it. One government agency said that if those 2,200 people had not kept their jobs, about 13,000 (other people in the community) would have lost their jobs because it takes that much in support for the healthcare system. It made sense from an economic perspective, for the community it made sense, from the continuity of healthcare services into the future it made sense.”

HLM: Would it not have been cheaper to lay off employees?

Britton: “Not in the long run. Those people would have had no choice but to go somewhere else to find a job. We are building a new hospital and when we open it back up we would have been spending enormous amounts of money to recruit that very talent back into the community. I would much rather have a resident professional medical community stay there and continue to deliver care and evolve with us and be part of dreaming the dream for the new community. So no, I’m not going to say that it would have cost less.”

HLM: How were you able to find that many jobs in such a short time?

Britton: “We started a program called talent sharing. We had enough Mercy facilities in the surrounding area that I’d hoped that many of [the employees] could find work there. I was also hoping that other hospitals in the area that were going to see some temporary growth in volume because of the displaced patients from St. John’s – that they wouldn’t want to staff up and recruit a workforce knowing that volume was eventually going to go back to St. John’s, and that they might be willing to use some of those resources to meet that temporary growth in demand, and they were.”

Britton: “The organization [that temporarily hires the Mercy employee] pays the hourly rate that they would for that position, and the Mercy coworker still keeps their original rate and benefits on our nickel and we bill and collect on the hourly rate at the other organizations. It helps offset but it doesn’t cover all the costs for that coworker.”

HLM: You’ve found work for about 95% of your St. John’s employees. Are you surprised by the success?

Britton: “I was pleased. We knew it would be a big challenge. It sounded daunting. I am a firm believer that you have to have big goals and dream a little, especially in moments like this that are crises situations. You can’t just accept it. You have got to get busy and work your way through it. So, giving people big goals like we did was important in the recovery, in the community, and in the professional recovery as well. Because you’ve lost everything, the place that you went to work every day and socialized with 2,200 people is gone. You have to have a focus and a way to bring yourself back to a new reality. Big goals that seem audacious or daunting are just what it takes.”

HLM: How has this affected employee engagement at St. John’s?

Britton: “It’s off the charts. They’re actively participating in designing the new hospital, and their work in the temporary facility is extraordinary. All the indicators show they are a very engaged workforce and very appreciative of what has been done to help them through this.”

HLM: Mercy has committed about $950 million towards the rebuilding effort in Joplin that will include a new 327-bed hospital. Did you have any concerns about the level of the investment in such uncertain economic times?

Britton: “I have had people say to me, ‘Those were terrible business decisions. Were you worried about your job? What did the board think about that?’ The short answer is if I had gone back to the board and said, ‘Let’s take the insurance money and run,’ that would have been a termination reason right there. Because we did the right thing, I never worried that the board would view it as a bad business decision. I knew they would view it as the right thing to do, and that is exactly what they did.”

HLM: What advice would you give other healthcare leaders facing similar crises?

Britton: “Clearly understand the situation and make some quick, appropriate decisions. Don’t be ambiguous ever about what you are going to do and how you are going to do it, and be bold when you face those moments. People will not remember if you didn’t get a decision just quite perfect during a moment like this, but they will absolutely remember if you don’t do anything or you are just in a state of inaction. That is far worse and does far more damage than being slightly off on one or two decisions at some critical moment.”