Issue link: https://beckershealthcare.uberflip.com/i/1465061
53 WOMEN'S LEADERSHIP 53 CEO / STRATEGY Renown Health fires CEO By Kelly Gooch T ony Slonim, MD, has been fired as president and CEO of Reno, Nev.- based Renown Health, according to a March 10 news release shared with Becker's. e health system said Dr. Slonim's tenure at the helm of Renown Health has ended, and omas Graf, MD, will serve as interim CEO. e health system said Dr. Graf will serve in the interim CEO role in addition to his cur- rent role as chief clinical and quality officer at Renown and senior associate dean for clinical affairs for University of Nevada, Reno School of Medicine. Sy Johnson, current COO of Renown, was promoted to interim president and COO. Dr. Slonim's firing came aer an internal in- vestigation, according to Renown. Citing a letter to board members, Fox affiliate KRXI reported that the internal investigation was over alleged personnel misconduct and that the board's audit and compliance committee, along with help from outside counsel, found that Dr. Slonim violated the health system's compliance program and code of conduct. No specifics were provided in Renown's statement. "Following the completion of a thorough in- vestigation of concerns raised to the board of directors, the board determined that Renown Health, its patients and staff required new leadership. Accordingly, Dr. Slonim has been terminated with cause as CEO of Renown Health," the health system's news release said. Adam Kramer, chair of the Renown board, added that "a new direction and leadership is needed given the critical work ahead" and that he has "complete faith in Dr. Tom Graf and Sy Johnson, and their senior leadership teams, who already oversee healthcare system opera- tions, and will help ensure a smooth transition." Dr. Slonim had served as president and CEO of Renown since 2014. During his tenure, he oversaw initiatives in- cluding the Healthy Nevada Project, a com- munity-wide DNA testing effort that began in 2016, according to the Reno Gazette Journal. Dr. Slonim also was in the news in 2020 when he defended Renown's alternative COVID-19 unit aer a tweet shared by President Donald Trump claimed the site was "fake." Before joining Renown, he was executive vice president and chief medical officer of West Orange, N.J.-based RWJBarnabas Health. n It may be time to enlist a Gen Z mentor By Georgina Gonzalez T he growing and distinct generational differences between older and younger employees may signal that building bi-directional mentorships could help older employees get on board with new trends and ideas and start closing the generational gap, James Heskett, PhD, posited in a March 1 Harvard Business Review working knowledge commentary. Reverse mentoring would force older executives to be vul- nerable and invest time and effort into forming relationships with younger, more junior employees. In return for their in- vestment, they stand to gain knowledge about what young people care about, which technology and trends are import- ant, and how young people feel about company strategy and direction. After a realization that the company wasn't making the most of new technology, former GE CEO Jack Welch suggested to his colleagues that they all find employees under 25 years old to learn to navigate the tech side of the business. This method could be used by more older executives, Dr. Heskett suggested. While reverse mentoring does occur generally, it often hap- pens in a spontaneous and unstructured way. Dr. Heskett asked why there are not more established programs of re- verse mentoring, asking whether the structured programs take too much time or instead whether older executives are unwilling to be vulnerable. n Tenet extends Ronald Rittenmeyer's contract for $750K a year By Ayla Ellison R onald Rittenmeyer will serve as executive chair of Tenet Healthcare until the end of 2023 under an amended employment agreement entered into in late February, according to a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The agreement extended Mr. Rittenmeyer's role as ex- ecutive chair for one year. He was originally slated to serve as executive chair through 2022. Mr. Rittenmeyer, who served as CEO and executive chair of Dallas-based Tenet for nearly four years be- fore leaving the CEO role in 2021, will be an executive adviser to Tenet's CEO and the company's board from Jan. 1, 2024, through the end of 2025, according to the amended employment agreement. Under the agreement, Tenet will pay Mr. Rittenmeyer an annual salary of $750,000, and he'll be eligible to re- ceive annual bonuses. Tenet, a 60-hospital system, reported a net income of $1.5 billion on revenue of $19.5 billion in 2021. A year earlier, the for-profit company reported a net income of $768 million on revenue of $17.6 billion. n