AI, Meet Your Healthcare Team: Crafting a Resilient Future with People-Powered Strategies

Culture as a strategy has long been a cornerstone for successful companies, like those articulated by Jim Collins in his book “Good to Great.” Gen. Gordon Sullivan, former chief of staff of the US army, says it this way: “People are not in the organization, they are the organization. The bricks and mortar, machines and computers [and yes especially AI] are there only to leverage the power of people… It is the people in your organization that make the difference.” In the realm of healthcare, where AI will rapidly become a mission-critical tool, this perspective will be the difference between great success and mediocrity, or worse.?

Defining Moments: What Choice to Make?

While serving as CFO of a large health system, leading the transition from paper to an electronic EMR it seemed the first and most important decision rested on what vendor to select. After completion of multiple site visits and many dialogues with health system executives who had already traveled the ground we were about to, I felt frustrated and confused. For every great story about a vendor there was a bad one, and all the vendors had roughly the same proportion. There was no clear winner.

In spite of our frustration, as we dialogued, we realized this truth: it wasn’t about choosing technology, but about people and process. The EMR vendors were struggling to keep up, so some clients had the A-Team and some got the B-Team. However, more important was how each organization approached the implementation; how they planned for it, engaged the staff in it, and executed to fully support physicians and nurses through it. This realization changed the way we approached our transition and where we placed the resources. And it went flawlessly, at a time when most didn’t.?

Are Your People a Resource?

Later, as President/COO of that same health system, we developed a five point plan we called our “Strategic Innovation Agenda.” We (but in truth and in retrospect, mostly I) placed people on our chart as a resource. The team began raising the issue that people needed to be one of the five points in the strategy. I disagreed and held my ground. Later, a PBS documentary on Southwest Airlines CEO, Herb Kelleher, was playing on the TV, and changed my perspective. He made a statement that people are a key strategy, even over customers. I knew the chief people officer that worked with Herb and her stories about this focus. So the very next day, I told the team I was wrong, thanked them for their persistent and clear challenge; we changed the chart, and built the strategy to support.

Three Nuances of Culture as Strategy:

1. Beyond the Basics:

Culture as a strategy is not:

• employee pay and benefits - though that helps,
• marketing and messaging - though there is a place for it,
• policies and processes - though they can be quite useful.

Jim Collins, in his research, outlines how great companies cultivate a culture of discipline, where people are self-motivated and aligned with the organizational vision. In healthcare, this translates to fostering a culture of intense collaboration, real teamwork and leadership of teams, and productive innovation.

2. Building Culture Methodically:

My friend Jeff James , when he led the Disney Institute once told me, “it’s not magical; it’s methodical.” It was true for Disney in creating world class experiences for guests, and I would argue even more so within the complexity of healthcare. The essence is having a plan, measuring and monitoring it, and living as leaders within it, consistently. The return is increased resiliency where every stakeholder contributes to the collective well-being of each other, the organization and the community.

3. Designing Leadership Systems:

Chris Argyris, a former organizational researcher from Harvard University stated, "People don't resist change. They resist being changed!" He emphasized the importance of learning organizations where people can challenge the status quo and bring about change. A leadership system is defined by facilitating dialogue, learning, and ensuring that the workforce understands and contributes to the organization's goals. In healthcare, this is crucial for adapting to the operational challenges today, but will be absolutely essential in the future for leading with the acceleration of change and implementing new thinking and technologies like AI.?

Conclusion and a Readiness:

The pandemic has further emphasized the importance of understanding AI not just as technology, but as a tool within your organizational culture. It has also clarified that health systems are its people (a concept you will find woven throughout my book, Lead With Imagination). AI will allow us to reimagine healthcare, and what it means to capture, care for, and convert those we serve into loyal users both in sickness and in health.

However, before delving into AI too far, healthcare systems should undergo an AI and Innovation Readiness assessment (yes, we at Csuite Growth Advisors can help with this). This step is a measured and reasonable next step (amidst the cacophony of noise) to ensure that the integration of AI is strategic, placed in the appropriate context of culture, ultimately wildly beneficial to the organization and the community it serves.