Latest / Becker’s Healthcare Podcast / Rural Healthcare Leadership Through Innovation and Strategic Partnerships with Michael Coyle

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Rural Healthcare Leadership Through Innovation and Strategic Partnerships with Michael Coyle · Becker’s Healthcare Podcast

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  - Hi, everyone. This is Scott King live from
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  - Becker's first ever rural health care leadership summit.
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  - I have a very special guest today, Michael
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  - Coyle, chief executive officer of Veterans Memorial Hospital.
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  - Michael, thanks so much for joining us. How
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  - are you? Absolutely.
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  - Doing wonderful.
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  - Had an opportunity to, do a presentation,
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  - already this morning.
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  - Great, crowd asking lots of great questions. Awesome.
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  - So glad to hear that. Great to have
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  - you here. You know, before we kinda dive
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  - into everything, I was wondering if you could
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  - please just kind of introduce yourself, a little
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  - bit about your role, and the scope scope
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  - of your organization, please. Yeah. So again, Michael
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  - Coyle, chief executive officer at Veterans Memorial Hospital,
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  - which is a 25 bed critical access hospital
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  - located up in Northeast
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  - Iowa,
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  - beautiful Northeast Iowa, right off the Mississippi River.
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  - We're an independent,
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  - facility that's county owned. We just went to,
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  - from city owned to county owned in 2022.
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  - We have about 375
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  - employees and offer a full range of health
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  - care, everything from delivering babies to doing surgery,
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  - inpatient care, public health, EMS,
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  - the whole ball of wax in a smaller
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  - community. Wonderful. So it's great to hear how
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  - much you have to offer the community there.
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  - What's currently commanding
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  - most of your attention as a leader right
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  - now? Well, there's a couple of things. One
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  - is this change of workforce that we're dealing
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  - with. You know, in the in the rural
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  - area, our bench strength is is pretty limited
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  - to begin with. And so, you know, struggling
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  - to find those
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  - those well seasoned leaders that want to move
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  - to the rural area
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  - or growing our own, which we have to
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  - do a lot. So so workforce is one.
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  - And then, of course, you know, things with
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  - payers. Payers right now, especially Advantage Plans, I
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  - tell my board of trustees there's no advantage
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  - to the Advantage Plans for the hospitals.
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  - So we're we're educating our community about, what
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  - they're buying in those Advantage Plans, whose responsibility
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  - it is,
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  - and,
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  - how how they can get the best care
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  - for what they purchased. So those are the
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  - things that we we talk about routinely.
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  - Oh, thank you. And you mentioned change. Like,
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  - obviously, this is a a year marked by
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  - rapid change.
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  - You might you might have touched on on
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  - some of this, but what recent decision or
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  - pivot required the most leadership conviction from you
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  - as an individual, particularly when it came to
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  - aligning people, you know, bringing people together and
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  - resources or capabilities?
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  - Yeah. This is a no brainer. So,
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  - about four years ago, we started partnering with
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  - the University of Iowa to offer EPIC to
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  - our our critical access hospital. So it took
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  - us a couple years of negotiation and understanding,
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  - getting money together so we could purchase what
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  - we needed to do. In June of last
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  - year, we started our implementation.
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  - Thirteen months later, you know, we went live.
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  - And so that was all hands on deck.
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  - And we went from,
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  - this was our fifth EMR transformation
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  - in about twelve years.
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  - The the few before that just didn't work
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  - out very well.
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  - And our providers and,
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  - staff really wanted to move to Epic. So
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  - that, again, that was all hands on deck
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  - for thirteen months. At the same time we
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  - are implementing
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  - Epic, we went live with MultiView, which is
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  - our ERP system.
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  - We changed our HR platform to UKG.
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  - We used Solvatron, which is the old three
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  - m,
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  - in in our in our coder,
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  - and scrubber systems. So we made a ton
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  - of technological
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  - technological changes all within a little over a
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  - year. And it sounds like they were changes
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  - that, you know, teammate teammates really wanted to
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  - have at the system. So Yeah. How did
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  - that moment challenge your assumptions, and what did
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  - it change about how you approached
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  - decision making,
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  - talent, or
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  - organizational readiness today? Well, first of all, we
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  - had we had to think strategically.
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  - Right? So, you know, not just getting through
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  - Epic, but what does the next two or
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  - three years look like after we go live
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  - with Epic?
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  - What does our our partnership with the other
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  - eight hospitals in our CCI
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  - consortium
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  - look like? And then, how do we make
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  - sure that we have enough funds to stay
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  - afloat? So, you know, decision support when it
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  - comes to financial,
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  - planning and decision making, all those things,
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  - are all wrapped up together in one. You
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  - mentioned decision making. When you think about the
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  - forces reshaping health care right now, where do
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  - you believe leaders need to be more decisive,
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  - especially when balancing speed, risk, and and having
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  - the right, teams in place?
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  - Man,
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  - that that that is a a golden question,
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  - and I'm gonna write a book and make
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  - a million dollars on this at some time.
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  - Just just mark my words. You know, it
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  - it really comes down to just just ensuring
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  - that that especially in a critical access hospital,
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  - that you've got the right talent doing the
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  - right things at the right time. K.
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  - Again, we have many staff that that wear
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  - multiple hats. Some are learning things as we
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  - give them new assignments. They're not experts at
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  - it yet. And so I think that's where
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  - our strategic partnerships come into play. So we
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  - can partner, like, for us, we partner with
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  - University of Iowa.
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  - We partner with Mayo Clinic out of Rochester,
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  - Minnesota.
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  - We partner with, Gunderson Health, which is now
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  - Amplify out of La Crosse, Wisconsin.
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  - And and you have to bring those partnerships
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  - together. We just don't have
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  - the bench strength to do all those things.
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  - Yeah. So I think that that's as leaders,
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  - we really need to acknowledge that, do what
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  - we can, but also be aggressive in developing
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  - those strategic relationships.
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  - Absolutely.
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  - And with so much change in health care
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  - currently,
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  - uncertainty has become the norm. What leadership habit
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  - or mindset has been most critical in keeping
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  - your organization
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  - and your people moving forward?
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  - You said it, forward thinking. No. We have
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  - to be forward thinking.
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  - You know, back in the days, smaller hospitals
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  - had the ability to be to be, you
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  - know, hey, let things happen. You know, we're
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  - not gonna be first, first to action, first,
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  - first, doing things. But now we have to
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  - be that way. We really do.
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  - Because we have limited resources,
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  - a, we got to mine those resources well.
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  - Right? We gotta know where they're at and
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  - what we're spending them on, and we have
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  - to do it,
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  - strategically.
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  - But but you have to then plan ahead
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  - a little bit. And I think, thirdly, is
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  - you you have to you have to challenge
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  - your everyday.
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  - You know, when I was talking earlier today,
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  - I talked about let's change the word change
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  - to innovation.
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  - Cause everybody's like change stinks, but innovation is
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  - wonderful. Right. It's very similar. Right? It's innovation
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  - is just something that you have never done
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  - in your campus. Somebody else may be doing
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  - it, but you have not. So now is
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  - a perfect opportunity
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  - to bring champions in and have them be
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  - innovation leaders. Yeah. And it can be small
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  - things. Right? It doesn't have to be gigantic,
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  - world changing things. So I think as leaders
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  - now, we we have to challenge the status
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  - quo, develop partnerships,
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  - be mindful of our resources,
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  - and be innovative minded. Yeah. And innovation versus
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  - change, I think it's a great point. How
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  - do you how do you define innovation versus
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  - change? Do you see innovation as kind of
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  - addressing
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  - change in a productive way? Or how how
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  - would you define Well that? Yeah. It it
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  - there there's a lot of definitions. What we
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  - what we say at Veterans is we we
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  - have this thing that's called Innovation Mondays. Right?
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  - And any staff member can come in,
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  - and and say, hey. In my department, can
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  - we do x y z?
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  - And so it comes to the senior leadership
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  - team. We look at it. We, you know,
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  - we we ask a lot of questions. And
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  - then if we implement that action, then, of
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  - course, we we give some some funds to
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  - to that employee as a recognition.
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  - But it re we really want innovation to
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  - start at the base level. Right?
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  - If we're coming to a great conference like
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  - here at Becker's and we come back with
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  - something that we don't do, that's that's very
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  - good. But sometimes it's those new employees that
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  - are coming from a different industry
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  - and they come in and they go, why
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  - do you do it that way? This makes
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  - no sense. In my previous industry, we did
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  - this way. And so you start to merge
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  - those together.
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  - And now those, those frontline staff that thought
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  - of it, now they're champions of it. Right?
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  - So, so I think that's what innovation means
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  - to us. It's just doing something differently to
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  - get a better outcome. And it can be
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  - small, it can be big. It can be,
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  - something where we save money and make money.
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  - Sometimes it's just doing a better job for
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  - the patient. Right? Absolutely. And then we gotta
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  - track it. Any innovation's gotta be trackable, benchmarkable,
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  - and something that,
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  - you know, you you can continue to to
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  - get better on a on a routine basis.
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  - Yep. Michael, thanks so much for joining us
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  - on the podcast and for speaking at Becker's
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  - first ever Rural Healthcare Leadership Summit. Really appreciate
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  - it. It. Well, I appreciate the time. What
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  - a wonderful place. What a wonderful organization at
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  - Becker's. And I think I I'm hoping that
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  - this is one of many great conferences for
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  - for rural leadership. We hope so too. Thank
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  - you so much. Thank you.