Latest / Becker’s Healthcare Podcast / AI, Workforce Strategy, and the Future of Healthcare Leadership

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AI, Workforce Strategy, and the Future of Healthcare Leadership · Becker’s Healthcare Podcast

• 0:00
  Hi, everyone. This is Brian Zimmerman with Becker's
• 0:02
  Healthcare. Thank you so much for tuning into
• 0:04
  the Becker's Healthcare podcast.
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  Today, we're gonna talk about AI and what
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  this means for the workforce and leadership.
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  Joining me for today's discussion is Shannon Libbert,
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  senior partner at Kingsley Gate. Shannon, thank you
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  so much for coming on the podcast today.
• 0:18
  Hi, Brian. Thanks for having me. I'm happy
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  to be here.
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  And to just get going here, can you,
• 0:24
  share with listeners just a bit more about
• 0:26
  yourself, your background,
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  and and your work in the health care
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  space?
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  Sure. Thanks, Brian. I'm as you mentioned, Shannon
• 0:32
  Libert, senior partner and health care practice leader
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  at Kingsley Gate. Kingsley Gate is an AI
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  native global executive search and human capital advisory
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  firm.
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  I've worked in health care for nearly thirty
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  years, which is showing my age.
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  But I've spent most of that time in
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  world leading health care consulting and advisory firms.
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  It's really an honor to return to the
• 0:55
  Becker's podcast. I have such great respect for
• 0:58
  you all in the community that you serve.
• 1:00
  Well, appreciate the kind words, Shannon, and it's
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  awesome to have you back on. And we
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  we truly appreciate you coming on, and we
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  truly do appreciate the community. We try to
• 1:09
  connect and and and inform.
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  Let's get in here to to to AI,
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  of course, which is, you know, on the
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  tip of everyone's tongue,
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  probably as it should be right now because
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  it is reshaping
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  nearly every corner of health care in some
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  capacity
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  at the moment. When when you're in the
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  room with health system executives, where are you
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  seeing the biggest shifts in terms of how
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  they're thinking about AI,
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  especially as it relates to, you know, their
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  workforce and and leadership?
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  Yeah. It's it's it's a good question. And
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  I would say
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  what's changed the most in the last year
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  or so is the level of urgency. So
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  when I'm sitting with health system executives, the
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  conversation has moved from
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  experimentation,
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  we're gonna dip our toe in this pool,
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  to
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  real execution. A year ago, it was pilots
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  and innovation labs, and today, it's much more
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  direct. Where do we deploy AI at scale
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  to improve things like access, stabilize the workforce,
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  and actually move our margins. So
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  one of the biggest mindsets
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  that we're seeing
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  today is around workforce strategy.
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  The executives that I speak with are no
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  longer framing AI,
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  you know, in in in very basic ways.
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  They're asking how
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  it can expand capacity and how it can
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  free up clinicians
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  to work, we always talk about, to the
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  top of their license. That shows up most
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  clearly in areas like ambient listening.
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  Physicians are getting time back in the evenings
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  where they used to be having you know,
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  they talk about pajama time where you would
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  chart in the evenings.
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  In places like revenue cycle
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  to improve, you know, the the expediency at
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  which funds are are received by health systems
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  and also things like nursing workflows and length
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  of stay. How do we automate some of
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  those processes
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  that can really meaningfully
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  reduce that administrative
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  burden? I I heard a lot, at the
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  most recent meeting about the cognitive burden, and
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  and I had a good discussion with another,
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  health care leader that was there who said,
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  but aren't we supposed
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  to have still cognitive input? And and it's
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  not that. It's the administrative
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  stuff that, quite frankly, takes time away from
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  time with patients at the bedside.
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  So it's also you know, when you think
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  about it, at the same time, it's changing
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  what leadership looks like. There's a growing need
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  for leaders who can translate across clinical, operational,
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  and technical domains.
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  We're seeing much more hybrid roles emerge,
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  digital data, AI leaders who aren't just advisory,
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  but they're accountable for those outcomes.
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  And importantly, boards are actually starting to ask
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  this new question.
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  Do we have enough AI fluency at the
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  executive level to make good decisions around technology
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  here? So it's becoming really an imperative for
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  leadership.
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  It's not just a technology conversation, though.
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  It's it's about culture, and it's an adoption
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  challenge, really. The limiting factor right now
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  isn't capability, and I've spoken about this before.
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  It's trust.
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  Leading organizations are investing heavily in change management
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  and clinician engagement
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  and also in being transparent about how AI
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  is used in decision making.
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  The systems that are getting traction
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  are the ones that are focused
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  where they prioritize a small number of
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  super high impact use cases
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  and scaling those
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  rather than the ones that are running
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  dozens or even, you know, in some case,
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  I heard one health system nearly a 100
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  they had nearly a 100 agents
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  and and running real fast with a bunch
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  of disconnected pilots. Right? I think the goal
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  should be,
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  at the end of the day, to improve
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  the experience for providers,
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  team members, and certainly, most importantly, the patients
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  that are served by the health systems.
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  Yeah. And I I imagine on some levels,
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  you know, that, much of the shift is
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  welcome in terms of alleviating that burden that's
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  really sort of, you know,
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  been placed on clinicians since the the rise
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  of the EHR, really.
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  But there's also, as you pointed out, sort
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  of the the there's a need for new
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  skills, new fluencies.
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  And that change is gonna, like, no matter
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  what, come with some anxiety.
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  And, of course,
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  AI, the the term itself brings its own
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  baggage when you start thinking about, sort of
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  jobs and and the people in them.
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  So from from your perspective, Shannon,
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  sitting in the seat, an AI native global
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  executive search and and human capital advisory firm,
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  how does Kingsley Gate how are you all
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  thinking about the the human plus machine equation,
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  I I guess is how I'll put it.
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  And what are you telling health system leaders
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  who are trying to wrestle with that both
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  themselves and for their teams? Right. Right. We're
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  we're yeah. As as you mentioned, Brian, we're
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  seeing this daily. Mhmm. And leaders really have
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  to focus on trust first and foremost. I
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  mentioned last time leaders shining light on what
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  the technology is intended to do and focusing
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  on the change management implications.
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  I highlighted
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  the the leader who took her whole team
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  off-site to really have a, let's talk about
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  this. Let's talk about how everybody's feeling. Let's
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  put it all out there so that people
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  who are maybe nervous about the implications
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  can really have their concerns addressed by the
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  leaders in a really transparent way. Our platform
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  was developed to help us as consultants and
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  our clients who are leading people across the
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  world
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  that quite frankly are on different places along
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  the technology continuum,
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  the technology adoption continuum for a variety of
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  reasons. You know? I think that we should
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  look at these advances
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  as ways to help us
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  do what we do best, which is focus
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  on relationships.
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  You know? At the end of the day,
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  that's what it's all about. No machine is
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  going to take the place of of building
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  that trust. I don't, you know, I don't
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  know if any of us inherently
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  trust any of the
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  AI agents that we're using. Right? They're they're
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  always I I was just a personal
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  aside. I've got a son who's looking at
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  colleges in a year or so, and they
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  kept Chet kept giving me all these colleges
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  that I know don't have the kind of
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  programs that he's looking for because that college
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  happened to be in my backyard. And I
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  kept saying to Chet, no. They don't have
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  that. No. They don't have that. Oh, you're
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  right. Good catch. You know? And I'm like,
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  I I still have to edit it for
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  even things that I use it for personally.
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  And I'll just say this too. I heard
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  a speaker,
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  at Becker's recently, a former president of The
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  United States, in fact.
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  And and he said, and I love this
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  quote, the ability to provide compassion
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  is not in the capacity
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  of a machine.
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  And, you know, compassion is what we need
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  at the core of any health care system.
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  Yeah. And I've heard it said before too,
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  like, sort of in this moment of the
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  the rise of AI, the era of AI
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  really need into
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  we need leaders and and people who are
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  really in touch from a human element. A
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  lot of emotional intelligence. Right? That's really the
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  the skill we're looking for. Right? Yep.
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  That's right. And and so data security, I
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  wanna get to that piece of this too
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  because, of course,
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  AI is all you know, it these applications
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  are only gonna be as good as the
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  data you have, and that data's gotta be
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  secure.
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  How how are you thinking about data security?
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  What what what are should executives be asking
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  for for any AI driven firm sort sort
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  of like yours? What what should they be
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  asking before they start working with them? Because
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  they've gotta take this very, very seriously.
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  Yeah. You're right, Brian. And and I will
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  say, you know, just from a Kingsley Gate
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  perspective,
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  we operate in 50 markets, which means compliance
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  isn't optional for us. We have to comply
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  with GDPR,
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  SSE two,
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  regional data protection frameworks, and sector specific requirements.
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  So so we really had to look at
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  all of that. And I would say for
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  health systems,
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  on the data security side, the executives have
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  to become much more
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  sophisticated in how they evaluate these partnerships that
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  they have. It's no longer also just compliance.
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  It's also control.
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  So leaders need to be asking questions like,
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  who owns the data? Can we extract it
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  if we leave?
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  And is our data being used to train
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  models for anyone else? You know, those are
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  important questions.
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  There's also
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  an increasing
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  expectation
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  around
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  transparency
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  and explainability.
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  Especially in those clinical high stakes operational settings
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  like finance or HR,
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  it's not enough for a model to be
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  accurate. Leaders have to understand how those decisions
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  are being made and how they're validated
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  against patient population. So it's it's well beyond
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  PHI
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  and things like that. You know? Of course,
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  we have to have security
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  architecture.
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  That's table stakes, but it's critical to unpack
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  things like encryption, data segregation.
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  How are we asking vendors
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  when we're evaluating a vendor? Are we asking
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  them to walk through real world scenarios? You
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  know, things like what happens in the event
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  of a breach?
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  How is PHI handled during training? And where
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  does the data actually reside? I I know
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  of several health system leaders who say we
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  don't want any of our data offshored.
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  And so that's that's an important, you know,
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  evaluation criteria that these systems have.
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  Also, you know, dependency risk, many,
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  native AI firms are built on top of
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  larger platforms or models. So executives
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  will wanna understand what sits underneath that and
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  really ask the questions.
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  You know, how does it plug into our
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  existing environment, whether it's Epic or oracle
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  or some other EHR?
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  What does implementation actually require from our teams,
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  and how quickly will we see the impact?
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  So at the end of the day, the
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  conversation has really matured significantly.
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  Health systems aren't asking whether AI matters anymore.
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  That's a given. It matters.
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  But they're asking who on their leadership teams
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  can operationalize it
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  safely and at scale and in a way
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  that really supports what our end goal is
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  is
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  is truly supporting clinicians,
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  the team members,
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  to drive those outcomes for the patients. And
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  that's where we're seeing the biggest gap, honestly.
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  The biggest opportunity right now is in those
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  areas.
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  Sometimes you you don't wanna know how the
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  sausage is is made, so to speak. But
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  in this case, it's absolutely essential that you
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  do that leaders do know. Correct? Yeah. You
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  you have to know. I mean, and and
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  I'm by no means a technical expert.
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  I I partner with them, but I know,
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  you know, I know the right questions that
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  we should be asking.
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  And, you know, having those key leaders in
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  those functional areas
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  is really, really important.
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  Yeah. And I wanna get to another piece
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  of this here because if if the the
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  technology driven transformation wasn't enough, we're also entering
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  what is a very unique generational shift in
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  the workforce right now. Right.
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  So big, big changes coming there. How does
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  AI really factor into that dynamic? And, I
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  guess, what do you believe executives should be
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  thinking about when they they're thinking about recruiting
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  and retaining talent across generational lines? I mean,
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  there's you know, you wanna retain some talent
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  so you don't have sort of this is
• 12:16
  a crude phrase, but brain drain, so to
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  speak. But it's also with the demographic shifts
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  in the nation at at large, you've gotta
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  be bringing on newer clinicians faster, You know?
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  Right. Which is faster probably than we've ever
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  done it before,
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  which presents its own set of challenges. So
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  many different ways, Shannon, for for us to
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  dissect this question, but I'll I'll just tee
• 12:36
  it up to you from there and let
• 12:37
  you let you go which way you wanna
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  take it.
• 12:40
  Yeah. Yeah. A little difficult to address all
• 12:43
  of that in a in a fifteen minute
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  segment, but I'll I'll do my best. And,
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  you know, with five generations in the workplace
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  now, it's it's really complex. I I always
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  advise people not to focus on recruiting where
• 12:54
  where for where their organizations currently are, rather
• 12:58
  recruit for where your organization needs to be.
• 13:00
  Because if if the leaders of the current
• 13:03
  organization and we see this a lot. You
• 13:04
  know? The the c suite in most organizations,
• 13:08
  that I come across are are in one,
• 13:10
  maybe two generations.
• 13:12
  The good ones are in three.
• 13:14
  Very few are in four, but that presents
• 13:17
  a real risk rather than a strength. Right?
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  If if every leader
• 13:21
  is within ten years of each other, that
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  that can be challenging. And that's what, quite
• 13:25
  frankly, what we've had, in health care. We
• 13:28
  used to talk a lot more, several years
• 13:30
  ago about the silver tsunami of of everybody
• 13:33
  retiring at one time, and we're seeing some
• 13:35
  of that. And so what we see also
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  is
• 13:38
  generational fluency.
• 13:40
  It's now a leadership competency,
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  and it should be evaluated in the hiring
• 13:45
  process.
• 13:45
  So I always tell my clients and I
• 13:48
  always try to prescreen for
• 13:50
  examples
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  of a time when you had to,
• 13:54
  motivate somebody in a different generation or when
• 13:56
  you've had to interact. And we talk a
• 13:58
  lot about mentoring and reverse mentoring and things
• 14:00
  like that.
• 14:01
  I I recommend that you ask for examples.
• 14:03
  Don't just assume based on someone's age or
• 14:05
  experience level
• 14:07
  that they know how to best relate because
• 14:09
  there are people in my generation, I just
• 14:11
  mentioned technology,
• 14:12
  there are people that are,
• 14:14
  just say it, Gen x,
• 14:16
  bordering on Boomer
• 14:18
  that,
• 14:18
  that have way more technical proficiency than I
• 14:21
  do. And then there's some that are that
• 14:24
  are more
• 14:25
  traditionally,
• 14:27
  geared. And I I will tell you, you
• 14:29
  know, the the the the newest generation in
• 14:31
  the workforce
• 14:32
  has a totally different,
• 14:34
  relationship with technology than I do.
• 14:37
  And so I think it's really important that
• 14:39
  that to understand that the next c suite
• 14:43
  leaders won't look like the last ones. In
• 14:45
  CHROs, for example,
• 14:47
  we see that the profile is really shifting
• 14:49
  toward those who are not just comfortable with
• 14:52
  data and AI governance, but are expert in
• 14:55
  those areas.
• 14:57
  They need to be as proficient
• 14:59
  as they are in those in those areas
• 15:02
  as they are in places like employee relations
• 15:05
  and culture.
• 15:06
  So it's really imperative.
• 15:08
  You mentioned retention, Brian. It it it really
• 15:10
  is a leadership imperative as well. Younger clinical
• 15:13
  and operational leaders are watching.
• 15:16
  They're watching what the c suite leaders are
• 15:18
  doing. They're watching how they engage with technology
• 15:21
  and navigate change management. You know, change management
• 15:24
  is is critical in all of this.
• 15:26
  And if those c suite leaders present as
• 15:30
  resistant and slash or disconnected,
• 15:33
  that signal
• 15:34
  is loud, and it travels quickly throughout an
• 15:37
  organization. And so, you know, a a a
• 15:40
  CEO who is walking through the hospital on
• 15:42
  their phone in some ways can be a
• 15:44
  good thing, but if they're not interacting with
• 15:46
  the staff,
• 15:47
  you know, that that that needs to,
• 15:49
  be an and versus an or. And so,
• 15:52
  it's really imperative for people to get up
• 15:54
  to speed quickly,
• 15:56
  because the the the organization is watching.
• 16:00
  Right. And and right now with all the
• 16:02
  all the change happening, it's gotta be
• 16:04
  especially concerning if if you're from from a
• 16:07
  frontline workers' perspective or even middle management perspective,
• 16:10
  if you're looking at your leaders and thinking,
• 16:12
  like, I don't know if they're keeping up.
• 16:13
  Right. You know, that's that's gotta be a
• 16:15
  little little bit concerning in this current environment.
• 16:17
  Right? Right. These are interesting times to say
• 16:20
  the least. No doubt.
• 16:22
  Well, let's close here by just,
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  I I I'll put one final question to
• 16:27
  you, which is, is there anything we haven't
• 16:29
  covered do you think that deserves more attention
• 16:32
  in this conversation? I think we actually covered
• 16:35
  a good bit of ground in a in
• 16:36
  a in a in a tight segment here,
• 16:38
  though some of these topics we could go
• 16:40
  on and on and on about. But what
• 16:42
  should have gotten more attention, do you think,
• 16:43
  in our in our talks today?
• 16:45
  Yeah. Thanks, Brian. I think I think we've
• 16:47
  probably covered most of it. I'll just say
• 16:49
  as a consultant who spends my days helping
• 16:51
  health systems prepare for the future,
• 16:53
  I do think AI can be quite valuable,
• 16:56
  and it's it's not optional.
• 16:57
  You know, our our tool and others like
• 16:59
  it give our clients the ability to focus
• 17:02
  on what matters most, and that's the human
• 17:04
  aspect. And that's what remains. You know, leaders
• 17:07
  have to have a strong presence.
• 17:08
  They have to build trust
• 17:10
  and have to be mindful that the only
• 17:12
  thing that's really constant is change.
• 17:15
  And so how the the best organizations manage
• 17:18
  through that can really differentiate them in the
• 17:21
  quest to find new leaders and and make
• 17:23
  themselves
• 17:24
  stand out from the rest of the industry.
• 17:27
  Excellent. Well, Shannon, thank you so much for
• 17:30
  for taking the time and coming on the
• 17:31
  podcast today.
• 17:32
  Yeah. Thanks, Brian. Take care. We also wanna
• 17:35
  thank our podcast sponsor, Kingsley Gate. You can
• 17:38
  tune into more podcasts in Becker's Healthcare by
• 17:40
  visiting our podcast page at beckershospitalreview.com.