Issue link: https://beckershealthcare.uberflip.com/i/1530792
12 CEO / STRATEGY 12 Center (Charlottesville, Va.): We are all works in progress for sure, and for me it's waking up, committing to doing the right thing, being courageous. For an academic medical center leader, it's always the commitment to action. ere's a lot to decide upon how you make these decisions and move forward. Take the time to stay close to the mission, stay close to patients and always do the right thing. It sounds so simple, but you always want to stay grounded as a leader, actively listening; always taking more time to listen to really understand, build the strength of the team and communicate well. It's nothing earth shattering or groundbreaking, but I think sometimes it's going back to the basics and being authentic and just doing the foundational components of leadership really well, which are really hard to do when you're busy and a growing organization. Seth Ciabotti. CEO of MSU Health Care (East Lansing, Mich.): Slow down. We're constantly moving so fast, whether it's personally, whether it's the team, whether it's outside forces. Slow down, take a deep breath and either look at your accomplishments. Make more educated decisions. In healthcare, there are a lot of type A personalities; everybody wants to move super fast, but sometimes you have to slow down a little bit and go slow to go fast. at's really the mentality I'm taking right now. Peter Banko. President and CEO of Baystate Health (Springfield, Mass.): I've absolutely gotten back to why I started doing this. I've got a great board that brought me here. eir sense of community is in every single conversation. We had a finance committee talking about our budget for the new year, and it's grounded in what we are doing for the community. How are we meeting our mission? How are we acting in ways that are consistent with our values? We are focused on getting it right rather than being right. I spent an evening with 50 or so of our physicians talking about how we can communicate more effectively. Where are the issues that are bothering them? We've got an unrivaled physician network, and as I told them, the team and I can literally move mountains. I've got such inspiring and supportive coworkers. We have our challenges, we have our fair share of challenges, but I love a challenge. Chuck Nordyke. CEO of Clarinda (Iowa) Regional Health Center: Prior to coming here, I was in a larger role for a national company. I had several different hospitals that I oversaw, and that version of leadership, being more remote and traveling in and out versus being back on scene, rallying the charge. It's a different mindset completely. In the last six years, I've learned a lot. I've been humbled. I've learned that your leaders, if you have a strong team, can really carry a lot of the weight and do a great job if you give them the tools to succeed and sit back and let them win. It's been really fun. We have a great team here, and if someone does leave another person steps up and does just as good of a job. It's helped us overall in recruiting, expanding services, our patient volumes in the last six years have almost doubled. We are doing the right things. Personally, being able to reflect and see where my strengths and weaknesses are, I work on making the weaknesses a little bit stronger and the strengths shine a little bit brighter. Having a strong team that you can work with very closely will help you grow. We have great resources in Iowa as far as the Iowa Hospital Association. I work really closely with them and the National Rural Health Association. ose two alone, and there are several others, we try to stay up to date with as much as we can. Make sure you are reading as much as you can. All those things do wonders to help you perform better. n 10 things to know about the path to — and from — CEO By Kristin Kuchno T he timing and approach to filling hospital and health system CEO positions vary widely across organizations and individuals. Here are 10 things to know about the path to and from the role. 1. COO and president were the most common backgrounds for CEOs in 2024, according to a Crist Kolder Associates study in which 10% of organizations were in healthcare. 2. Internal promotion was also a common path, with 43.7% of CEOs being promoted from COO or president. 3. Hospitals reported 66 CEO exits in the first half of 2024. This is down 19.5% from 82 exits in the first half of 2023. 4. The average age of newly hired CEOs is decreasing, but it is still higher than it was in 2014. The average age was 51.8 in 2014 and 53.5 in 2024. 5. Female CEO appointments have nearly doubled in the past decade among Fortune 500 and S&P 500 companies. Among the healthcare organizations, there was one female CEO appointment in 2014 and five in 2024. 6. Hospital and health system CEOs starting their careers in other industries is not unprecedented. "This is still more the exception than the rule, but it's indicative of healthcare organizations getting creative around leadership and hiring to ensure success in a more challenging environment," Michelle Johnson, senior partner at executive search firm WittKieffer, told Becker's. 7. Retirement remains the most common reason for hospital and health system CEOs resigning, among the CEO exits recently reported by Becker's. 8. Joining a new system, switching hospitals within the same system or taking on non-CEO roles were other common paths out of the position. 9. Some CEOs choose to stay involved with their organization after exiting the role, such as Joseph Chirichella, who was named president emeritus of Brown Mills, N.J.-based Deborah Heart and Lung Center. 10. Succession planning strategies such as flexible timelines, committing to project completion and aligning stakeholders are valued by retiring healthcare CEOs. n