I was surfing around and came across a blog by a hospital CEO in Boston. He offers a unique lens into his hospital and his life as a CEO. Check out his 11/12 post on being a patient in his own facility. What do you think of his blog? Would you like having this type of access to a leader in an organization you are working for? What does it say about his leadership style and why else might he be maintaining a blog such as this one? http://runningahospital.blogspot.com/
Kim
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
12 comments:
Prior to reading the blog, I had some initial skepticism about a CEO having the time to do this and what the ulterior motive might be. I would assume that this was an attempt at transparency and accessibility to top leadership. This has its limitations in that the information can only reach those that have internet access and have the interest and/or time to read such a blog as patients and more generally, the information must be filtered to a certain level. As a student in public health, I might be interested in reading it but as a patient, I’m not sure that I would care very much. In his posting about being a patient in his own hospital, I understand that there are issues with lack of privacy and specialists being more cautious about interpreting his results, but I would not have much sympathy as the everyday patient, trying to make sure I have regular access and am receiving the highest quality care consistently. In that sense, I experienced some dissonance rather than relating to the experience. On the other hand, as an employee, I think I might be amused to read about the CEO’s current thoughts. Ultimately, my feelings are mixed. I acknowledge the effort it takes to maintain the blog, but depending on my orientation, I may or may not find the information relevant and helpful.
Frankly, my brief perusal of this blog leads me to believe this CEO is rather self-absorbed, and wishes to promote a sense of openness with readers. He includes information about his daughter's dance performance, and other personal data.
I'm not sure what message he wanted to convey with the November 12th blog entry. If this blog were for his extended family, it would seem fine to me. However, if he's trying to educate people about medicine, or his hospital, or his functioning as a CEO, I think his blogs should have a little more depth.
I may be biased...my dad was a patient at his hospital. Two days after a prostate biopsy, my dad spiked a high fever and had shaking chills. His doctor told him to stay home and wait it out. I was in Boston and insisted that my dad be seen immediately. Within minutes of arriving in the hospital, my dad "coded" and ended up in the ICU - he had septic shock. Perhaps I should have sent a letter to the CEO about our experience. I wonder if it would have been posted.
Interesting blog. The description had me expecting a totally healthcare-focused blog, but in fact it turned out to be more about the life and perspective of a hospital CEO, along with announcements about employee achievements and hospital recognition. There is a real mix of Levy's personal take on issues, and more factual, operational hospital information. I was kind of intrigued by the sense of wonder he incorporated into his posts about the healthcare experience, and I couldn't really figure out where he was coming from--so I googled him! Apparently his background is in water management and he was a relative newcomer to healthcare when he took over at BIDMC. I think this explains a lot of the more reflective pieces - they represent parts of the learning process around operations issues that are specific to healthcare. Sharing his learning process suggests an organizational culture of learning and of transparency, though of course these are only the pieces of information that he decided to share. My best guess for why he might have a blog like this is that it allows a large staff to feel a personal connection with him, and gives him an opportunity to share not just decisions and mandates, but detailed reasons behind those decisions and mandates -- things that staff would make up on their own if he didn't manage how information is communicated.
I'm skeptical of his motives too -- I hope this blog is a part of many efforts he makes to actually be accessible, and not just a token use of "new media" for its own sake or a way to seem more accessible. But given the frequency of the posts, it seems like he (and/or someone else) is putting a lot of time into this. A post from yesterday that included a physician's response to a previous post of Levy's about quality seemed like the kind of thing that blogging is made for -- and the comments on it from other doctors, and patients, suggest that people are really reading this thing. While he can obviously post (or not post) whatever he wants, it seems like it's generating some thoughtful dialog about current issues. The page-view counter at the bottom of the blog shows a little over 200,000 views, and it looks from the Technorati search engine like a couple of hundred other blogs have linked to it -- while I don't think those numbers are high for the blogosphere, this blog is definitely a part of a larger conversation.
At first, I too found myself being critical of this CEO and his management style based on his Nov. 12 post. His entry seems to give the impression being cloyingly playful or cutely ironic, at the same time that it makes him seem like he's out-of-touch with the clinical operations of his hospital since his experience as a patient in his hospital was such a foreign experience for him.
My impression changed the more I scrolled around to read some of his other entries. Using the blog for personal reflection as well as to communicate to hospital staff suggests a degree of ordinariness that I could relate to. I would imagine it having a similar effect on some of his employees. I also think its admirable, if not flat-out daring, that he promotes this level of transparency for the public. If were him, I would be worried of saying too much, or of being perceived as speaking for "the management." Considering his willingness to post responses from physicians to his comments, I also wonder how many private conversations make their way into the blog.
I think it's easy to react skeptically to any gesture from the management to promote collegiality in the workplace, but this blog seems to create a useful forum for communication and a sense of personal connection to a higher-up. And as Diana points out, the number of hits certainly suggests people are listening.
I'll start by stating that I'm not a huge fan of the "blogging", do not read "blogs" and thus was skeptical of the CEO "blog." I think it's great that people have acces to the CEO in this manner. I wonder how much time he actually spends blogging. Which then, in a pessimistic view, makes me wonder why he has so much time to blog. I view it as a "human interest" hook on how to get people interested in what is going on in the hospital. Maybe some people out there really do care about his experience getting his colonosopy. Perhaps its his way to hook people in to being interested in screening tests/etc, analagous to a "USA Today" approach to getting certain demographics to read the newspaper. How about "email your CEO" in which he is required to respond to each one, without any triaging or screening process of message types received? Just a thought since it seems to be a new popular tool to use with physicians. Overall, I do give him kudos for innovation in integrating technology in his management style. I wonder what kind of impact, if any, it is having on staff and patients. I personally would not read it or be interested in keeping up with a CEO blog, but, as stated at the beginning, may just be my personal preference.
I liked it. It made me think about the role-play project we did in class a while ago, where we were deciding how to improve communications in our hospital, and were figuring out whether a newsletter or other communications from the CEO made sense. I think this is a neat way to do shout-outs to staff, appreciate people publicly, share ideas, and spread messages throughout the organization. I'd be curious to know who the readership is... how many people, how regularly?
Daring, Gutsy, Admirable. My gut feeling of why the BI and Deaconess (BIDMC) (a top teaching hospital in boston) would hire a CEO with NO experience in managing a hospital is that they needed major culture change. Here's what I found from trusty google:
1. Levy was hired in 2002, right after the BI/Deaconess merger. Theses two prestigious hospitals were at the brink of a breakdown after the failed merger.
2. His career involved turning around Boston Harbor from being one of the filthiest harbors in the US. IN his most previous post, he was an executive dean at Harvard Medical School. He's not a doctor.
3. He has a reputation for being outspoken/gutsy/honest/blunt/innovative/no sugar-coating. He revealed BIDMC's problems to staff and the public - an invitation to criticism. He asked for suggestions on how to fix them and personally answered 300 emails.
I also looked at his FIRST post, in Aug 2006. By this time, BIDMC has rebounded back from a 2001 $58.5M loss to a $33.7M operating profit. Paul keeps focusing on "organizational change" and made transparency to the public and staff among his priorities. (See the resources listed below).
Perhaps this blog is to gain public applause of its new successes, rebounding from its dismal merger activities. Regardless, this is a smart effort by Paul to reach out to his community of patients, doctors, admins, general public. During the BI/Deaconess merger (prior to Levy's CEO appointment), staff was told "sugar-coated" stories of the organization's downfall. This drove morale down and increased their lack of trust in the organizational leadership. I think Levy's blog validates his commitment to transparency at his organization at all levels and boost staff trust in their leadership team. It personalizes him when he talks about his daughters. It removes the executive "intimidation" so perhaps his staff would be able to use the blog as a tool to inform him about the problems of the organization. Unless you hear from the floor what is broken, you can't fix it. He is open to criticism/complaints and responds to them. He reads and writes in his blog almost every night. One thing to note is that he does not do this during his working hours. Most of the postings are at odd hours - during his personal time (4am, 6am, 8pm, 10pm, etc)! This leads me to believe that he truly believes in his efforts. He is a shrewd implementer of organizational change... and it really takes a gutsy person with thick skin to take an organization in its reins, turn it on its back and land upright, in a position to sprint forward.
Here are some interesting resources of Paul Levy: I wonder if he'll give me an informational interview on organizational change!
http://hbswk.hbs.edu/item/4688.html
Rx for Merger Trauma (march 2006)
http://www.cfo.com/printable/
article.cfm/5598469?f=options
Another CEO blogger: Nick Jacobs
I am not quite sure how I feel about the online world, blogs being one of the key reasons. It seems like everyone has a blog these days and information is rarely filtered. It's a way for people to vent, share information, and oftentimes rant on about the meaningless things that happened in their lives. That being said I didn't find the blog to be that helpful, particularly as a would be patient. In fact, I took much of the information shared with a grain of salt. I am not quite sure what the CEO's motive is for starting the blog, aside from having a venue to vent. How helpful and relevant is it to the patients of this hospital I am not sure. It may be an attempt to reach out to the masses and create an image of accessibility to someone of important (like a CEO) but I think like anything else it's a marketing ploy. I understand that's a cynical stand to take but per my stated biases I don't think blogs are my thing.
I'm torn about what to say in response to this blog. Some of the post seemed simply absurd and a waste of company time (Amazon ebooks???). Some were about hospital quality or were congratulatory to staff, but it seems a memo would have been an equally effective method to distrubute this data to the interested parties...I doubt patients, except perhaps those with very frequent stays at the hospital, would read the blog. Actually, I think when it comes to patients (myself as a patient included)ignorance often is bliss. Patients don't want to think of hospitals having bottom lines or realize that there are quality issues. Yes, we know this in the back of our mind, and some people make use of this information, but mainly patients want to believe the best about where they recieve their care. That being said, the blog, even when presumably offering "damaging" information, it is still framed in a light that this hospital is at the forefront of dealing with the issue, an issue that the patient cannot avoid by simply seeking care elsewhere...I can't really figure out the underlying motive for the blog, and it holds little appeal to me. I have a hard time believing anyone would frequent it and, frankly, I fing its usefullness fairly low...
I don’t have a problem with Levy’s blog. My comment isn’t specific to Levy’s 11/12 post in particular, but more about the concept of his maintaining a blog in general. As has been mentioned, the fact that he even has the blog indicates that he’s going for the “approachable and modern” persona. What’s wrong with that? Personally, I like a leader who at least makes an attempt to reflect on his/her work and communicate how he/she feels about it. I think the more communication channels a leader can have with his/her employees, the better (especially for a leader of a large organization who probably doesn’t interact much with the frontline people). The randomness of the subjects of the posts makes me think that Levy didn’t have a specific goal for the blog and that its major aim is just to share thoughts, and that’s fine. It would be interesting to see if the “approachable” management style that Levy may be trying to pull off using the blog squares with his employees’/patients’ impression of him.
Although I appreciate the CEO's efforts at trying to increase transparency and improve communication, I'm skeptical what impact it will have or whether it is fulfilling its intended purpose. I can't imagine that a patient would really find the blog useful, except to gain a sense that the institution is open and accessible, and perhaps by extension trustworthy. It does seem however that people are interested in reading what he has to say, considering the comments that his posts draw and the relatively high number of views his blog is receiving (as Diana mentioned). His blog does seem to be turning into a new forum where comments by physicians. management, patients, and complete outsiders can engage in some form of dialogue, which seems novel to me, and it would be interesting to see how it develops in the future.
Post a Comment