HIMSS21 – ready or not

Posted by on

According to HIMSS there are over 18,000 people registered for the big event next week – either in-person in Las Vegas or virtual/digital. It’s not clear what the split looks like. With the current surge in COVID cases, I assume many registrants may decide to convert to virtual and not travel to Vegas in the next few days. I saw last week some people calling for HIMSS21 to be cancelled. I remember well the days leading up to the HIMSS20 cancellation in March last year. Who would have thought we’d be here again 17 months later? HIMSS appears to be taking all the necessary precautions with vaccine proof required of attendees and now adding a mask requirement while there.

I decided months ago to forego in person HIMSS this year. HIMSS20 registrants did not receive refunds but could apply it to HIMSS21. The conversion value from a full registration to a digital one was not a good one given the significant price difference but there wasn’t another choice as far as I knew.

In past years, I’ve written tips on attending HIMSS and how to make the most of it. Those general tips on education, networking, and vendors still hold true whether in-person or virtual. The education opportunities are probably what digital attendees can get the most from though I’m hoping there are also opportunities to learn about new vendors from a distance.

I’m usually a last-minute planner when it comes to HIMSS. I don’t usually look closely at the schedule and make my specific plans until close to the event. As a digital attendee, I tried to keep my calendar flexible next week so I could attend as many digital sessions as possible. But as busy as I am these days, that didn’t work out so well.

So, I’m down to spending some time this weekend figuring out what is available for the digital attendees, deciding what is of most value to me given my current work and focus, and what’s even possible given my calendar. I’m open to any recommendations on digital sessions from those among you who have mapped out your plans. And any general tips on making the most of a digital registration.

Bill Russell has an interesting plan for his HIMSS time next week which will be virtual after he recently assessed his own personal risk level. Continue reading →

One of those weeks… (again!)

Posted by on

I wrote “One of those weeks….” several years ago. As usual, I had a lot of blog ideas that week but no time to write given how the week evolved in “CIO land”. I recently moved my blog writing and publishing schedule to the weekend but with this past weekend filled with getting a house ready to list, that just didn’t happen. When we first decided it was a good time to sell and downsize, I told my husband I couldn’t deal with it while I was still doing this interim CIO engagement and giving weeknight and weekend hours to my consulting firm, StarBridge Advisors. I was just too busy.

Once we started looking at places, we decided to jump in and not wait. So here we are, getting the house ready for pictures so we can list it (you know those pictures in the online listings that look like model homes and as though no one lives there). It’s still a hot seller’s market so hopefully it will sell fast. But we’ve been there before only to be disappointed by a longer than expected sales cycle.

Being super busy means being organized is not an option – it’s a necessity. Prioritizing, staying organized, timeboxing, and knowing when to get help are just some of the skills needed now. As I’ve admitted in the past, I am a work in process in all these areas. If you can relate, check out some of these past posts:

Struggling to get (or stay) organized? You are not alone

Managing priorities and maintaining balance

7 tips for managing in the fast lane

What does weeding have to do with work?

Operation Baby Blanket

Yes, despite the funky titles of the last two, even they are useful. Lot of good reminders and tips for me during this period. If you find yourself busier than you can handle, you might just find something useful here as well.

Vendor relationship management revisited

Posted by on

For IT leaders, effective vendor relationships are critical. In previous blog posts, I have provided guidance on creating win-win relationships and outlined what makes up a successful ongoing vendor relationship.

I am currently serving as interim CIO at Boston Children’s Hospital, the fourth health system I have served as an interim IT leader since 2016. I am experiencing vendor relationships and the challenges of vendor management all over again. Revisiting some of my own advice has been useful to me so I decided I would share it again with my readers.

12 tips for effective vendor management is a useful refresher worth another look. Let me know if I missed anything.

I would love to hear your stories of vendors who stepped up as true partners with health system IT teams to find creative solutions, expedite deliveries and provide extraordinary customer service during the pandemic. After all, 2020 was a test for all kinds of relationships.

Related Posts:

Keys to successful vendor management

What to expect from your vendors

COVID-19 – listen to the experts

Posted by on

Dr. Anthony Fauci may be a household name for your family. But what about Andy Slavitt?  He is a policy expert who served in the Obama administration first to save health.gov and then as acting administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services. During the pandemic he provided reliable, relatable information and education with his daily tweets at @ASlavitt and award-winning “In the Bubble with Andy Slavitt” podcast.  He quickly became a household name with my family and a trusted resource. Many trusted him and looked to him for insight.

He served as President Biden’s Senior Advisor on COVID-19 for the first 120 days of the new administration. He is now back from the White House and in his chair on the renamed podcast – “In the Bubble with Andy Slavitt: Our Shot”.  As the podcast description says, “Just as he took us through the pandemic, this 10-week series called Our Shot is about leading us out. It’s an insider’s guide for getting closure on what happened, how we emerge, and what must come next.”

Busy as my schedule is, I am trying to keep up with this new series. So far, I have heard his interviews with CDC Director, Dr. Rochelle Walensky, and President Biden’s Press Secretary, Jen Psaki. And I am halfway through Andy’s just released book written primarily prior to his recent stint in the Biden Administration. His book, “Preventable – The Inside Story of How Leadership Failures, Politics, and Selfishness Doomed the U.S Coronavirus Response”, is a must read. Not just to understand what happened but how do we prevent it from happening again.

While COVID-19 may seem to be behind us, it is not when you consider the variants and the percent of the population not yet fully vaccinated. Continue reading →

Remote work – writing chapter three

Posted by on

In my blog post late May, “Remote work – what next?”, I commented on the balance needed as organizations begin to bring people back to the office. Balancing the organization’s needs with the individual’s preferences and choices. I concluded that the organizations that are thoughtful in their plans and supportive of their workforce during this transition time will be most successful in retaining and attracting talent. I noted that chapter three of remote work was just beginning to be written.

I continue to hear from colleagues on their approaches and see many articles on the subject. That includes a rather concerning one, “The Great Resignation…..by Remote Workers”, written by several senior partners at the search firm Korn Ferry. One of my CIO colleagues shared it on our Children’s Hospital Association (CHA) CIO Forum Hot Topic Call last week when we were discussing our respective approaches to continuing remote work. The article describes the challenge of retaining employees who now know they can be a remote worker for companies anywhere who may offer a higher salary or better benefits and perks. They emphasize the need for organizations to rethink their retention programs and find new and innovative ways to incorporate remote workers into the culture.

It was useful to hear from CHA colleagues – flexibility is the operative word. Having broad guidelines and letting individual managers work with their teams on how best to make a mix of remote and onsite work most effective for them. A few of the CHA CIOs talked about national recruitment with each having several states where they are approved to recruit from. For an organization that primarily operates in one state and hires from a few bordering states, expanding recruitment nationally will depend on HR support and dealing with tax laws. But if you do go down this path, one CIO cautioned that you need to ensure inclusivity and find ways to make out of state employees feel part of the culture.

My colleague and principal at StarBridge Advisors, Russ Rudish, wrote an excellent blog post recently outlining the challenges and opportunities that both employers and employees are focused on as we enter this next chapter. In “Now What? Working in a Post Covid World”, Russ comments on recruiting and retention, work / home separation, feeling part of a team, and more. As he says, there are no quick or simple solutions but how companies address them will have significant and broad impacts. Continue reading →

Rounding in a virtual world

Posted by on

If you are a regular reader of this blog, you know I am a fan of lean concepts and practices. In fact, my posts on lean have been some of the most popular ones over the years. So, it is no surprise that I have embraced a form of rounding or “gemba” now that I am serving as interim CIO at Boston Children’s Hospital.

As part of our commitment to being a High Reliability Organization (HRO), Boston Children’s Hospital has a program called “Rounding to Influence” (RTI). With this program, senior leaders meet with staff in their areas to discuss a specific topic and solicit input. The Rounding to Influence program is facilitated by David Davis, Vice President, Patient Safety, Quality and Regulatory Affairs. When I learned about the RTI program several weeks into my interim engagement, I was quick to start participating.

My first experience was tagging along virtually with Laura Wood, EVP Patient Care Operations / System CNO, on her rounds with clinical staff along with a few of my IT leaders. Given the topic for that session was about having the right information to perform your work, it was a great place to start and hear from our clinicians and support staff. Here were the questions:

Having the right information and data is important to everyone in order to perform their roles effectively.  Depending on your role, do you have trouble finding the information or data you need to do your job?  Do you know how and where to get the information/data you need?  Do you have concerns you are seeing incomplete or unreliable data?  How would you know?  How can we be more reliable in our information and data sharing?

The obvious next step was to start virtual rounds with our own IT staff. Here is how it works. Continue reading →

Yes, culture matters

Posted by on

“I love this organization”. That is exactly what I said to my husband last Thursday after hearing several presentations in three different forums as part of the team at Boston Children’s Hospital. It started with the monthly Department Heads meeting that opens with a patient and family story and closes with an inspirational quote.

That meeting was followed by a lunchtime every other week series (dubbed Fireside Chat), open to all employees focusing on how we are supporting our patients and each other. Dick Argys, Chief Culture Officer and Chief Administrative Officer is the host. As part of our Juneteenth series of events, the topic was “The History of Juneteenth”. Our guest speaker, Theodore Landsmark, PhD, JD, Distinguished Professor of Public Policy and Urban Affairs at Northeastern University along with Peter Faiteau, Patient Services Administrator for Oncology/Hematology/HSCT, talked about the history and significance of Juneteenth.

The Juneteenth series was announced in an email from Dr. Kevin Churchwell, President and CEO to all employees last Monday – before it was declared a national holiday. He acknowledged that it was only the second year Boston Children’s was celebrating Juneteenth and closed his email with this: “Boston Children’s celebration about Juneteenth is all about learning from each other. And the more we learn about our history, the better equipped we are to build a brighter and more inclusive future for all”.

That was followed by an open forum for all employees, “Transforming Tomorrow: Investing in Children, Families, and Communities”. Dr. Churchwell and a panel of leaders described the new inpatient building opening in summer 2022 (far enough along for an inspiring video) and the new ambulatory centers being planned in nearby towns making care more accessible to families in the broader Boston area.

And earlier in the week we had all been invited by Dr. Churchwell to a virtual celebration to announce and congratulate the entire Boston Children’s team on being ranked the number one children’s hospital in the nation in the 2021-22 U.S. News & World Report “Best Children’s Hospitals” rankings. Continue reading →

Treasuring family after a long year

Posted by on

I hesitate to say “post COVID” or “post pandemic” even though there are signs of the new normal as organizations roll out their plans for employees to return to the office, states drop their mask mandates and businesses are allowed to open at full capacity. But when will we be truly “post COVID”? While the U.S. COVID-19 cases and deaths are at new lows, the global situation is far different and the variants continue to be a concern. Globally, there have been more deaths in 2021 than all of 2020. So it is far from over.

I am glad that I live and work in states with high vaccine rates and where mask mandates were accepted and not protested. In both Rhode Island and Massachusetts, over 60% of the population has received the first dose. In fact, all the New England states are at that level of vaccination, and all are over 50% fully vaccinated.

In the past few weeks, I have experienced more “firsts” in this transition to the new normal. We had friends over for dinner. Our Saturday morning outing at the local farmers market no longer requires masks. Wandering the stalls with our two little dogs, it is good to chat with strangers like we used to. We went to a Red Sox game and seeing so many people in one place was a big change. The wave doesn’t catch on the same at partial capacity but the enthusiasm for the Red Sox hasn’t changed. At my hair salon, my most recent haircut was the first without a mask; they are no longer required if you are vaccinated. On my daily walks, I no longer cross the street when someone else is walking towards me with their dogs but rather stop and talk and let the dogs do their sniffing thing.

Being in public places without a mask is one thing. But being with family is what I have truly missed. Our immediate family (our two daughters, their husbands and all the grandchildren) has not all been together since early November. Our few get togethers last year were outside socially distanced with masks as needed. We respected everyone’s comfort level and deferred to the least comfortable. Continue reading →

7 years later

Posted by on

I started this weekly blog 7 years ago right before our major Epic go live when I was serving as CIO at University of Michigan Hospitals and Health Centers. Given my decades of experience in health IT leadership roles, I decided that I had plenty of lessons and experiences to share. A blog seemed like a great forum to do so.

7 years later, I am still writing. I have shared lessons and experiences that have included my interim CIO and CTO engagements at three other healthcare systems since I left Michigan – University Hospitals in Cleveland, Stony Brook Medicine on Long Island, and University of Vermont Health Network. Since March, I have been serving as interim SVP and CIO at Boston Children’s Hospital.

I often wonder how much longer to keep this going. How much more do I have to share and who cares? The feedback and appreciation I get in notes and comments from readers keeps me going. And the topic ideas keep coming.

I was asked recently how I find time to write each week. Good question. I am pretty busy. I am a full-time interim CIO and am helping my colleagues keep things going at our firm, StarBridge Advisors. My response to the question is that I have a lot of ideas and not enough time to write. With this week’s post I am changing when I publish. I will try to write on the weekends and publish early in the week instead of percolate an idea all week and then finally write it Thursday night when I am exhausted.

And while I have a lot of topic ideas, I am definitely open to suggestions from my readers. I was recently asked by a CIO colleague if he could suggest topics – of course I said yes.

At this 7-year mark you might be interested in knowing which posts have gotten the most attention. In the world of social media, keywords, amplification, and cross linking are key. The top 5 most read posts since I started are:

It is worth mentioning that #6 is “New year, next chapter”. Continue reading →

One year later – an increased focus on diversity, equity and inclusion

Posted by on

A year ago this week a small number of Minneapolis residents witnessed the death of George Floyd. Within days, the world knew what had happened and responded. There were mass protests in cities across the country and the world.

It was a time to reflect as companies across the country looked internally at their own practices and culture. Many started programs focused on Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion (EDI). Those with programs already in place revisited and strengthened them. At Boston Children’s Hospital where I am currently serving as interim CIO, they reaffirmed their commitment. This past week, Dr. Kevin Churchwell, President and CEO, sent a note to all staff outlining some of the work that has been done in the past year in support of their six core EDI commitments with the subject: “One Year after George Floyd’s death, our work continues…..”

The core commitments are:

Goal 1: We will be truly inclusive.

Goal 2: Our team will be as diverse as the patients and families we care for.

Goal 3: We will eliminate racism from our processes, practices, and guidelines.

Goal 4: We will continue to educate ourselves to be an inclusive working environment.

Goal 5: We will work to eliminate health disparities in our community and across the nation.

Goal 6: We will develop and use metrics to continually improve our performance in equity, diversity, and inclusivity.

As Dr. Churchwell said in his message, “George Floyd’s name became a rallying cry for millions and yet another compelling reason to discuss tensions around racism and social injustice. One man’s life became a symbol of so many lives lost needlessly. Disparities and inequities long considered to be “part of the system” became impossible to ignore. Here at Boston Children’s, we took a hard look at ourselves, and we realized that we need to be part of the solution to these important issues.”

Many of you or your CIO may be members of CHIME. In 2020, I joined the CHIME Diversity and Inclusion Committee which was established in early 2019. Continue reading →