In 2024, Judy Faulkner, founder and CEO of Epic Systems, shared her advice, insights, personal philosophies, and stories across a range of topics, all shaped by her decades of experience.
Here is some of her greatest advice, as reported by Becker's:
- Ms. Faulkner reflected on a 1998 marketing lesson that challenged her initial skepticism about advertising. After an unconventional strategy using a "belly band" to highlight Epic's No. 1 KLAS ranking proved successful at a major conference, Ms. Faulkner humorously fulfilled her promise to "eat her own words" by consuming a soup made with pieces of the campaign material.
- Ms. Faulkner emphasized the importance of balanced leadership teams, likening effective partnerships to the concept of "yin and yang." She observed that when one half of a complementary leadership duo departs, the dynamic often shifts significantly, underscoring the need for contrasting strengths in leadership.
- Ms. Faulkner highlighted the complexity of health IT, particularly in integrating inpatient and outpatient care systems to create a unified patient record. She attributes Epic's success to its focus on seamless continuity of care, emphasizing the intricate programming required and noting, "Healthcare IT is more complex than rocket science."
- Ms. Faulkner credited her company with advancing healthcare interoperability by encouraging health systems to embrace data exchange. She shared how the development of Epic's Care Everywhere platform and involvement in national initiatives like Carequality and TEFCA aimed to ensure patients' data could be shared seamlessly across providers, regardless of the EHR vendor.
- Ms. Faulkner said she takes pride in her employees prioritizing software innovation over financial metrics like EBITDA. She credits Epic's private ownership for fostering a culture focused on improving patient outcomes, with financials playing a minimal role in decision-making.
- When Ms. Faulkner meets with health system executives to discuss EHR purchasing, she always asks, "What is in the best interest of your patients? Ten years from now, will you look back and say, 'That was a good decision'?"
- In the early stages, Epic faced challenges in establishing its reputation in the healthcare industry. Ms. Faulkner shared an anecdote from years ago when a large health system initially considered ruling out Epic but ultimately found its integrated software to be superior during a demonstration. The efficient integration of Epic's software, requiring data entry only once, proved advantageous over the competitor's collection of disparate modules, which necessitated repetitive data entry. This demonstration played a crucial role in shaping the health system's perception and choice of EHR vendor, according to the CEO.
- Ms. Faulkner says she dresses up in costumes at Epic's annual User Group Meetings in order to liven up what could otherwise be a tedious topic. "UGM themes are helpful because they are entertaining. Several hours of discussing software could be boring if not for a fun theme," Ms. Faulkner wrote in a blog post.