Leadership, Governance and Culture

Leadership from the Ground Up: Growing Leaders, Building Culture
Kelly Derbin, M.D., M.S.Ed., Medical Director and PAFMG Leadership Development, and Suzanne Golden-Riley, M.B.A., Director, PAFMG Leadership Development, and Amy Maramag, Project Manager, PAFMG Leadership Development, Palo Alto Foundation Medical Group

Creating a culture of leadership engagement and accountability is vital to the success of any healthcare organization and developing strong clinician leaders is a key step. In this session, hear how Palo Alto Foundation Medical Group launched a frontline physician leadership development program from the ground up by leveraging internal content experts, data analysis, and Lean tools. Speakers will walk through the Clinician Leadership Development Cycle, including how self-assessment of skill gaps and training improved knowledge and competence. They will also identify how to conduct a leadership development needs assessment, design and build a formal leadership program, and utilize standard tools and Lean methodologies to ensure high-quality programs.

Upon completion of this activity, participants should be able to:

Identify the steps to conduct a leadership development needs assessment
Design and build a formal leadership development program
Utilize standard tools and Lean methodologies to ensure high-quality programs

Formation of a Supergroup: A Governance Structure for Growth That Allows Retention of Culture
Daniel Duncanson, M.D., CPE, Chief Executive Officer, and Scott Johnson, M.A., M.B.A., Administrator, DDA Section, SIMEDHealth, LLC

Size matters in the ever-changing world of health care, with many independent groups finding it harder to remain autonomous as their negotiating leverage with payers shrinks. Over a two-year span beginning in 2016, Florida-based SIMEDHealth developed an innovative corporate governance model that allows for blending governance and multiple corporate functions while keeping the clinical area decisions local. In this session, leaders will outline the steps taken to prepare, establish, and implement the new governance structure. Depart with new perspectives on identifying appropriate partners in your market and building a workable foundation for governance and operations.

Upon completion of this activity, participants should be able to:

Identify appropriate partners within their market area
Identify the steps to consider for building the foundation for governance and operations to increase their current and future relevance

Winners and Losers: Rolling Out a New Compensation Plan and Avoiding Physician Departures
Elisabeth Stambaugh, M.D., M.M.M., Chief Medical Officer, Wake Forest Health Network

Culture change is one of the most difficult aspects of any merger and creating a single physician compensation plan is one of the most sensitive topics when different medical groups combine. At North Carolina’s Wake Forest Health Network, formed in 2018 from four legacy physician groups, implementing a common compensation plan was fraught with land mines. In the session, leaders will share how they overcame hurdles to develop a new compensation plan, focusing on the methods used to gain acceptance with minimal physician departures. Learn from their experience how to implement significant changes in a controlled, yet transparent manner designed to minimize disruption.

Upon completion of this activity, participants should be able to:

Describe the complexity of merging physician groups while evolving to a new group culture
Develop strategies for implementing significant change with varied effects on physicians in a controlled, yet transparent manner designed to minimize physician departures

Choosing Medicine All Over Again: A Systematic Methodology for Restoring Joy to the Practice
Rupal Badani, M.D., Medical Director, Organizational Advancement, and Christopher Fitzgerald, M.D., Primary Care Lead, Cedars-Sinai

Physician burnout remains an ongoing epidemic in health care, leading to provider turnover, decreased productivity, compassion fatigue, and declines in personal health. In this inspiring session, hear how Cedars-Sinai’s implementation of Practice Transformation, a Lean-based, systematic approach to redesigning clinical practices, has restored the joy in practicing medicine and has enhanced the experiences of care teams and patients. As the medical director for organizational advancement at Cedars-Sinai, Dr. Badani will share how she leverages her medical background and Sensei expertise in Lean methodology to partner with clinical and operational teams. Hear how Lean systems, such as daily management and cross-functional teams, can boost physician engagement and redesign healthcare delivery.

Upon completion of this activity, participants should be able to:

Describe burnout syndrome, how it differs from frustration or disengagement, and the different types of approaches that have been tried to reduce it
Identify the framework of a Lean management system including how strategy deployment, cross-functional management and daily management and how they reciprocally influence each other
Demonstrate the tight connection between the experience of physicians and care teams to the patient experience, and how the former enables the latter
Apply ideas and tools on how to engage leadership in a conversation about implementing change to address professional gaps in physician engagement or satisfaction at their organization
Describe the importance of incorporating Lean management systems to enhance the experience felt by the physician, care teams, and patients and their families

Journey to Integrate Multiple Medical Groups into a Single, Self-Governing, High-Performance Medical Group in an Integrated Healthcare System
Eugene (Gene) Monroe, M.D., Vice President, Strategic Projects, and John Konkel, M.D., Chairman, Board of Directors, Aurora Health Care Medical Group

Many health systems are aggregations of individual employed physicians or multiple semi-autonomous, loosely integrated medical groups. Aurora Health Care Medical Group has succeeded in forming a single, integrated high-performance medical group strategically aligned with the health system. In this case study, learn specific steps that can be followed to integrate multiple medical groups into a single, self-governing group, starting with forming work teams around common objectives, developing specific models and documents, and creating a governance structure. The speakers will highlight positive outcomes from this process in the areas of financial performance, clinical and service quality, engagement, recruitment, and retention.

Upon completion of this activity, participants should be able to:

Identify the critical components of an engaged, high-performance medical group
Delineate a process to integrate multiple medical groups within an integrated health system into a single, high-performance medical group

Gaining Influence by Losing Control: Building a New Kind of Employed-Physician Organization and Culture
Richard D. Rolston, M.D., FAAP, Senior Vice President, Saint Luke's Health System, Chief Executive Officer, Saint Luke's Physician Group; and Michael Munger, M.D., FAAP, Family Practice Physician, Vice President, Advanced Primary Care Transformation, Saint Luke's Physician Group

Giving up autonomy doesn’t mean losing influence—not when it’s done right. In this presentation, learn how Saint Luke’s Physician Group formed a new employed-physician group that not only rewards efficiency, but empowers physicians to become leaders. In this session, presenters will outline multiple phases of their journey to create a high-functioning physician group within a health system, one that now includes more than 500 physicians and almost 300 advanced practice providers. Hear about the leadership training, team-building, organizational structures, and best practices used to overcome challenges and lead to a successful launch, including important lessons learned along the way.
Upon completion of this activity, participants should be able to:

Develop a high-level strategic plan for the creation of an employed-physician organization
Describe the constraints and challenges of creating such an organization
Prevent or overcome some of the challenges in maintaining operational excellence