As president and CEO of Livonia, Mich.-based Trinity Health, one of the largest nonprofit, faith-based health systems in the nation, Mike Slubowski regularly navigates critical operational and strategic decisions.
Mr. Slubowski, who helms a 101-hospital system with 120,000 employees across 27 states, is quick to point out that there is no most significant decision, but rather many decisions leaders make after considering a range of factors. As he puts it, "A good leader doesn't bet the farm on one critical decision."
In a conversation with Becker's, Mr. Slubowski discussed one of those decisions: establishing a community division focused on expanding outpatient care. This includes urgent care, medical groups, freestanding ambulatory services and the PACE program, a comprehensive, community-based healthcare initiative designed to help older adults receive personalized care while remaining at home.
He said that, like most organizations, Trinity Health was already on a path to diversify community-based services. However, efforts accelerated about two and a half years ago with the appointment of Daniel Roth, MD, chief clinical and community division operations officer, who now leads those initiatives.
"You have to view where healthcare is going outside of an acute care lens," Mr. Slubowski said. "Those structures can get in the way of strategy. If you're structured around the hospital being the center of the universe, it's hard to get people, processes, technology and culture pointed in a new direction."
As a result of that appointment, Trinity Health — which includes 26 continuing care locations and 136 urgent care locations — saw year-to-year growth in those community services of 10% or greater. Now, Trinity Health aims to continue this growth, particularly with its medical groups.
"We have some markets with very large and well-developed medical groups, like in Michigan, Ohio and Boise, Idaho, but we have other markets that are less developed, like in Maryland, for example," Mr. Slubowski said.
He said Trinity Health also wants to take advantage of opportunities for transactions related to ambulatory surgery initiatives. In April, Nampa, Idaho-based Saltzer Health, a physician group, sold three facilities to Boise-based Saint Alphonsus Health System, part of Trinity Health.
"We have measures around growth, net promoter scores, efficiency and profitability for each of the community-based services," Mr. Slubowski said. "It's important to have the right leadership, the right measures in place, and to pay attention to all four aspects of change: people, processes, technology and culture to support the strategy."
He added that regarding those aspects of change, "you can identify best practices, and there are technologies to help support changes in practice. But the hardest part for any leader is how it affects people and how it changes the culture."
He advised his peers to put equal emphasis on all four aspects of change as they evaluate options and reach any significant decision.
"We tend to underestimate the time it takes to engage people in change and change the culture," Mr. Slubowski said. "If you don't put equal emphasis on all four aspects of change, you're going to do rework."
His recommendation: "Focus on a shorter list of essential, high-priority objectives and do them very well. If you spread yourself too thin, you won't be as effective."