With a myriad of opportunities to change the business model at hospitals and health systems, CEOs must choose a path, but more importantly, they must motivate others in the organization to carry it out.
It's tough to get 40 CEOs in a room to agree on anything, but if there's one thing on which they have consensus, it's that translating strategy into execution at their organization is among their greatest challenges. No wonder. If even the leadership doesn't completely understand how healthcare reform will affect their business specifically and over what time period—and don't let anyone kid you, no one does fully understand—it's difficult to chart a course.
But it's not impossible.
Executing on strategy is something CEOs must do. They have to be soothsayers of sorts, divining the future of their organization and critically, developing a road map to get there, with landmarks of achievement and success that will be evident along the journey, lest anyone lose faith. And ultimately, that's what will get you there: your employees' faith in the vision.
"Because of all this turmoil—all this constant change—if you can give them focus as to what their priorities should be and you continually follow through with that, that really helps," says Charles Hart, president and CEO of Regional Health in Rapid City, SD.
What I learned from that discussion at our most recent invitation-only CEO Exchange back in September is that not even top leaders are brash enough to think they have the answers. Yet they have to present a confident vision of the future, that if x, y and z are accomplished, the organization will thrive now and into the future. Talk about putting yourself out there.
You've probably heard the expression, "culture eats strategy for lunch." I hear it all the time and get awful tired of hearing it. But the reason people say it is because it efficiently describes a truth. While it's hard to make a universal declaration on a transformative environment that varies so widely geographically, what's exciting about much of today's work in cutting costs, rewarding quality, and reducing overutilization is that these tasks dovetail nicely with the reason most people got into healthcare to begin with.
That mission allows leaders extra goodwill to build a collaborative culture, a culture that's focused on those goals. That's not a small thing, because it's rarely been the case that patient, employer, payer, and provider interests have aligned at all. There are many strategic paths that will help an organization's top leader reach the board's goals, but only one way to get them executed: people at the front lines who believe in that strategy.
"You have to convey a sense of confidence to the people all around you. At the same time you are dealing with several complicated circumstances for which there are no immediate answers," says Paul Macek, vice president of affiliations and partnerships at UnityPoint Health Methodist/Proctor in Peoria, IL. "What helped me was that as long as I was clear on the vision we were attempting to achieve, I could navigate through all of the ambiguity and uncertainty."
I was lucky enough to be the moderator for three sessions at the CEO Exchange, where I got to hear how 40 healthcare CEOs are trying to solve the issue of execution. As agents of change, today's CEOs have a lot more on their plate than their predecessors—so much new—that it seems there's little time for the building of consensus and the development of shared motivation to do what's right for the patient.
To read their insights, take a moment to download my free report, "The CEO as Agent of Change," on the sessions. You'll see that even though CEOs don't have all the answers, they have an abiding faith that if they rework processes, care protocols, and incentives for quality care with a focus on value for the purchaser—whether that's a person, an employer, or even a health plan—all will turn out OK in the end. That's exciting, because it's why some of these most talented people got into healthcare in the first place.
There are huge investments to be made, in both people and infrastructure. Depending on the size of the organization and its current capabilities, leaders may be starting an accountable care organization, alone or with other hospital or health system partners, to help manage that focus on value that's coming on like a train. Maybe you've realized your organization can't do it on its own. You don't have the scale or the continuum of care that will be required to manage value. So you're merging with larger organizations or carving out creative business partnerships.
Where can you be more efficient? How can you change sites of care to better utilize your organization's talents? How can you communicate better with the rank-and-file so they know there's a plan to succeed?
Our CEOs didn't have all the answers, but they had some helpful suggestions, and their tactics on motivation should be required reading for peers. They all learned from one another. You can learn from them, too.
Philip Betbeze is the senior leadership editor at HealthLeaders.