Becker's Hospital Review

22 POPULATION HEALTH 22 CEO / STRATEGY Dr. Stephen Klasko of Jefferson Health: 3 best pieces of advice for leaders By Laura Dyrda S tephen Klasko, MD, has led Philadel- phia-based omas Jefferson Universi- ty as president and Jefferson Health as CEO since 2013. During his tenure, the health system has grown from three to 14 hospitals and increased reve- nue from $2.2 billion to $5.1 billion annually. Dr. Klasko joined Becker's Healthcare Podcast Dec. 15 and shared his top three pieces of ad- vice for emerging leaders. Below is an excerpt from that conversation, lightly edited for length and clarity. Question: What are your three best piec- es of advice for emerging leaders today? Dr. Stephen Klasko: First, learn from what other industries have done. To me, so much of this is to think about what will be obvious 10 years from now and do it today. I had the chance to work with Apple when they were moving from a computer company to a dig- ital lifestyle. ey talked about the old math and the new math. e old math was com- puters and operating systems, while the new math was a digital lifestyle. Just like in health- care, we have to recognize what we've existed on at Jefferson for 50, 60 years, from in-per- son tuition and inpatient medicine, is going to go away. e only question is whether or not we can figure out a way to have a stable revenue model while we're getting this care out to where people are. e second one from a personal level is if there is anything the pandemic has taught us, it's that the No. 1 goal of a leader in a crisis is to be able to communicate, and communicate in a way where folks look at it personally. I used to be a DJ, so I've made music one of the ways we com- municate. Every Friday I have a conversation with employees around some of the things hap- pening positively, some of the challenges, and share music they can listen to over the week- ends that will hopefully enfold them and have some synergies in what we're doing at Jefferson. Communication could not be more important all the time as a leader, but it's especially import- ant when you're going through a crisis. Finally, if you're in a leadership position, al- ways hire five people under you that think they can do a better job than you and three that are right. Don't be afraid of hiring really, really great people. Maybe they will want your job, but that is going to help you be stronger. n Erlanger restructured nearly 200 nonclinical manager roles since fall 2019 By Morgan Haefner T he number of nonclinical managers at Erlanger Health System has dropped from 290 to 93 since the health system's CEO was directed by board members in fall 2019 to reorganize management, accord- ing to the Chattanooga Times Free Press. William Jackson, MD, took over as CEO of the Chatta- nooga, Tenn.-based health system in September 2019. In October of the same year, Erlanger began reorganizing by cutting and restructuring about 30 management posi- tions. Since then, the system's number of nonclinical man- agers has fallen by nearly 200. Most of those roles have been restructured and reas- signed rather than eliminated, an Erlanger spokesperson told Becker's Hospital Review Dec. 23. The system does not have plans to change its new management structure, the spokesperson said. At the time of the first October 2019 management chang- es, Dr. Jackson told the Times Free Press the reorganization "is not going to be in vain." He said the system will "use this to become streamlined and lean, and ... better over time." Erlanger ended fiscal year 2020 with a $30.2 million net in- come thanks to $55.9 million in COVID-19 aid, according to the health system's financial report. This compares to a net loss of $4.4 million in fiscal year 2019. n Beaumont adds 3 physicians to board after staff express disapproval of leadership By Alia Paavola S outhfield, Mich.-based Beaumont Health added three physi- cians to its board of directors. The move increases the num- ber of physicians on the board from three to six and bumps the total number of board members to 19. The three physicians joining the board are: • Abed Asfour, MD, vice chief of staff at Beaumont Hospi- tal-Trenton (Mich.) and cardiology section chief and director of interventional cardiology • Ashok Jain, MD, CMO at Beaumont Hospital-Wayne (Mich.) • Robert Welsh, MD, physician executive for surgical specialty with the Beaumont Medical Group The appointments come after several physician and nurse sur- veys conducted in the summer of 2020 revealed a lack of con- fidence in the health system's leadership and concerns about a now-squashed merger with Advocate Aurora Health, which has dual headquarters in Milwaukee and Downers Grove, Ill. The appointments are intended to help thwart clinician dissatis- faction with leadership decisions. "Many physicians were nominated, and we went through a com- prehensive review process that ultimately led us to select these three esteemed physicians," John Lewis, chair of Beaumont Health's board of directors, said in a Dec. 21 news release. "All of our board members volunteer their time and talent to support Beaumont in advancing our efforts to provide compassionate, ex- traordinary care every day to the communities we serve." n

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