In this special Speaker Series, Becker's Healthcare caught up with Stacey McCreery, founder and president of ROI Search Group.
Ms. McCreery will speak during the Becker's Hospital Review 4th Annual Health IT + Revenue Cycle Conference on "Navigating Change: The Journey of Clinical and Financial Integration," at 2:45 p.m. Wednesday, Sept. 19. Learn more about the event and register to attend in Chicago.
Question: Can you share your best advice for motivating your teams?
Stacey McCreery: Motivating teams is critical to your long-term success. There are a few ways I do that with my team. First, at every team meeting we share the reason we do our work. We do executive search and talent management for healthcare organizations, but why? The core of our mission is to make patients' lives better and impact their lives. With our work, I know we do that. So every team meeting we start out with our core mission. Second, we have listed our core values on our website to be very transparent to our clients on what matters most to us. Then, we spend time volunteering in activities that will effectuate change. Giving back is core to our mission by volunteering time and financially supporting those organizations. Bottom line, [staying] focused on our mission and our core values motivates the team. We not only talk about it at every meeting so we stay focused, but we live out that mission. #ChangingPatientLives
Q: Describe your biggest failure. What did you learn from it?
SM: My number one failure is not allowing someone to follow our process. We have a unique process in our business that differentiates us, but sometimes people do not want to follow it. Early on, I allowed a client not to follow it. That was my failure. I learned the reason our process works is clients and candidates follow it. It allows transparency, trust and better long-term outcomes for talent management. I learned when clients choose not to follow the process [that] perhaps we are not a good fit for a partnership, and that is okay. We need to accept that. I learned not everyone is going to be a partner and share the same values and mission that we do. I often tell our team 'failure only makes you refocus your energy, get better and be a better person than you were yesterday.' #StayFocusedOnYourCoreValues
Q: What is the No. 1 thing you wish you knew before taking a leadership post at your organization?
SM: It sounds intuitive, but communication or the lack of communication is challenging. As a leader, I have had to navigate with our own team, employees throughout my more than 20 year career, clients and partnerships. Communication is important but a challenge, and I wish I knew how much of a challenge it really was before I was a leader so I could have been prepared for it. That being said, now that I know it is a challenge, I address it head on with the team. It is core to our values to communicate back. It makes a difference when you do. People notice. We tell our team we expect a 24-hour business-hour response to everyone. If we do not know an answer, giving them an update that we are awaiting next steps really matters. How you treat people and communicate really matters. That ongoing communication helps people we are communicating with not wonder where they are in the process. I am a firm believe that the better the communication, the better the outcomes. At every team meeting we reinforce the [importance of] communication … and how it is a critical part of our culture. Being a strong communicator will not only differentiate yourself but really matters and provides strong assurance. #CommunicationIsKey