Hospital and health system CEOs must think strategically to prepare their organization for success over the long term.
Becker's regular series of conversations with CEOs of the nation's health systems poses a variety of questions, including what leaders are reading to prepare for the next three to 10 years. Here are answers collected this year.
Editor's note: Responses have been lightly edited for clarity and length. This article was updated on Dec. 18.
Larry Antonucci, MD. President and CEO of Lee Health (Fort Myers, Fla.): There's a book that I finished called "21 Lessons for the 21st Century" by Yuval Noah Harari. He's a historian. And it is a fascinating book that delves into what the century is going to look like regarding AI and robotics and computers and globalization. And how Big Data is watching us and the fact that when we use computers and we use the internet that we're not customers, we're actually the product. The information we put in there is being sold to others. It's really a very fascinating thought provoking book. I would recommend it to anybody.
Shane Bedward. CEO of AdventHealth Dade City (Fla.): I am reading about how to differentiate ourselves in healthcare — specifically around experience and technology — and how we use technology to augment our services, to scale, and to make sure that our services are able to not only provide for the patients that we see today, but also the patients of tomorrow. From an experience perspective, we have to be more nimble and more understanding that patients want to be part of the care experience. They no longer just want to be pulled on the journey, but part of the journey. And how do we integrate using MyChart Bedside and those tools at the bedside to make sure that the patient knows exactly what the next steps are, and include them in their care journey? So when they go back home, they know exactly how to continue that remedy — the discharge process — making sure that they're driving their health from a wellness perspective that hopefully will prevent them from re-entering the hospital in the future.
Lourdes Boue. CEO of Coral Gables, Fla.-based Doctors Hospital and Miami-based West Kendall Baptist Hospital: It's more on a personal level of what decisions you make as to when you trigger your exit strategy from an industry where you've been dedicated to it for 45 years. How do you reinvent yourself? How do you still stay connected to the industry you love? How do you still make a difference to patients and to staff and to leaders without having the obligations of a C-suite role? And what does that look like? And that's really more of the research that I'm doing today for the next three years now.
David Herman, MD. CEO of Essentia Health (Duluth, Minn.):There's a book that came out in the 1980s called "The Wise Men: Six Friends and the World They Made." I'm reading that again … because I truly believe, particularly in times of stress, that leadership matters, and that there are times that are made for different types of leadership. And one of the reasons I'm reading those books is because … in several years, I'll be handing the reins of this organization off to someone else. And I need to be developing a diverse group of young leaders who will be ready to lead. So I will need somebody that perhaps is strategic, or someone that's a hard driver, or someone that is a calming hand in times of turmoil. And I need to have all those people ready for my board to select from as they choose the next leader of this organization. And I find that reading about the history of society, societies and leaders, and learning about the characteristics of different leaders, helps me frame on a daily basis what I need to do to develop the leaders for the future of my organization.
Bob Riney. President and CEO of Henry Ford Health (Detroit): I'm reading a book right now called "Attack from Within: How Disinformation Is Sabotaging America" by Barbara McQuade. The book itself is about the level of disinformation flooding citizens of our country [through] social media networks. But what I'm walking away with from reading the book is the unbelievable impact that [misinformation] is having on our mental health. And so I look at the advancement of disinformation and its sophistication as a real threat to our mental health and the impact that it could have on healthcare because we're already seeing mental health demands that we are struggling to keep up with. And I think that the issues that are raised in this book tell me that we're going to see a lot more, and we have to prepare for it.