- The strategic agenda facing hospital and health system
- leaders right now is not a short list.
- Growth in a consolidating market, sustainable margins in
- a reimbursement environment that rarely moves in your
- favor,
- a tech investment cycle that demands both urgency
- and discipline,
- and a workforce story that is still being
- written.
- Eker's fourteenth annual CEO CFO roundtable brings together
- more than 1,500 executive level attendees and nearly
- 400 speakers across four days of sessions that
- are designed to help c suite leaders benchmark,
- pressure test, and sharpen their priorities.
- Not in the abstract, but against the real
- decisions they'll face heading into the next year.
- It's the kind of event you leave with
- a clear sense of where you stand and
- what comes next.
- So join us November second through the fifth
- at the Hyatt Regency in Chicago, and come
- ready to do the hard thinking.
- Register on our events page at beckershospitalreview.com
- by clicking on the events tab in the
- upper right.
- Welcome to this episode of Leadership Unscripted, a
- Becker's Healthcare podcast. I'm Chris Sosa, your host.
- And I'm thrilled to be joined today by
- Jim Andrews. He, of course, is president and
- CEO of Deborah Heart and Lung Center in
- New Jersey.
- Jim, thank you for joining us today. Thank
- you very much, Chris. I appreciate being here.
- Fantastic. Yes. Of course. Leadership Unscripted.
- This is a podcast where you where we
- talk about leaders' health care journals and all
- that is important to them as far as
- that's concerned. So, Jim, before we dive into
- that, though, could you please, introduce yourself a
- little more a little more in-depth to our
- audience and tell us about, Deborah in general?
- Certainly. So,
- Jim Andrews, president and CEO of Deborah Heart
- and Lung Center.
- Been working here for
- two years now,
- and
- very happy and pleased to work here at
- Deborah Heart and Lung Center.
- Deborah is a 104 year old organization. It's
- a specialty
- heart, lung, and vascular hospital,
- which is independent.
- We are located in Southern New Jersey, and
- we've been operating at
- a mission that it think is critical in
- health care today,
- and it's to ensure that all of our
- patients are cared for physically, emotionally, and financially,
- and we support them in all three elements
- of their care journey.
- We've got amazing quality outcomes of some of
- the best in the state of New Jersey,
- some of the best in the country,
- and we really dedicate everything that we can
- at the center to ensuring that people live
- healthy heart, lung, and and vascular lives.
- Jim, thank you for mentioning in particular
- the elements of the care journey
- that Deborah makes sure to
- that uses as part of its mission, you
- know, to care for its patients.
- With that in mind, we wanna talk about
- your journey, of course, as we mentioned up
- top. So
- as far as that's concerned, my first question
- is, what is something that you learned
- outside of health care that you've applied to
- your career?
- I mean, I think
- the the most important thing, which is the
- the one that is probably truest to
- everyone in health care is the the golden
- rule.
- Treat others as you would wanna be treated.
- Tenth grade, shout out to miss Sylvia.
- We all had to read Dale Carnegie's How
- to Win Friends and Influence People. And the
- the biggest takeaway I had from that was
- the golden rule and making sure that whatever
- I was doing in life, it was reflective
- of
- that moral code and just to
- care for people in a way in which
- I would
- wanna be cared for myself.
- I think that rule, that Acxiom
- is what brings people into health care
- in the first place. So we have a
- nice little cohort in health care
- of people that subscribe to
- that general philosophy, and I think it's incumbent
- upon all of us and certainly everyone here
- at Deborah,
- to make sure that
- that that golden rule stays in health care.
- And now everyone is looked at with kindness
- and empathy and compassion,
- not just a a number on a balance
- sheet or
- as a a cog in a wheel. You
- wanna prioritize
- the individual. So I found that early in
- life and carry it with me now.
- That's an excellent outlook to have, especially in
- health care, Jim. Do you still have that
- book on your on your shelf, by the
- way? I do. No. At home. I I
- don't bring it into the office, but,
- it's usually a a podcast or, you know,
- book on tape that I'll I'll listen to
- commuting every couple of years
- just to remind myself a lot of lessons.
- The the references get a little bit dated.
- That's true. We start talking about Abraham Lincoln
- these days, but, the moral of the story
- is is always true. So definitely encourage anyone
- that hasn't exposed themselves to it to to
- have a listen.
- Definitely. Definitely.
- So, Jim, you mentioned that the care journey
- is not just one dimensional.
- So with that in mind, my next question
- is simply, how do you keep yourself healthy,
- and that's physically, emotionally, mentally,
- and however you wanna define it? Starting with
- those three, though. Yeah. I mean, those those
- are the the big three.
- Physically,
- I'd say it helps to be married to
- a vegan.
- So I I'd say I'm vegan adjacent.
- If I'm adjacent to my wife, I am
- vegan. We keep a vegan house.
- So I have a pretty well balanced,
- diet.
- We my wife and I also do yoga
- together
- twice a week
- and try to get to the gym as
- much as possible, which usually means waking up
- at 04:30 in the morning
- to to get down there and do what
- we gotta do.
- That does help balance someone emotionally.
- So,
- the the three parts are not independent of
- each other.
- For emotional balance, I would say
- keep your friends close and your mentors closer.
- You need people to talk to that can
- give you some advice and perspective.
- I have one of my,
- career mentors,
- is actually on the board
- here at Deborah Heart and Lung Center,
- and he joins joined me when I started
- this journey as president and CEO because I
- knew I needed the the help and the
- and the guidance.
- And,
- you know, what I try to do when
- I'm feeling a little stressed out,
- is to always remember that things are never
- as good as you want them to be
- or as bad as you think they are.
- And the expression in the office here, and
- they they give me a little bit of
- a hard time about it,
- is just to to stay in the box.
- Keep yourself balanced in the middle. Never get
- too high, never get too low, and allow
- you to ride out the waves.
- That's great advice, Jim.
- Thinking about, the whole vegan adjacent thing, was
- it something is is it something you find
- hard to adapt to with your diet? Or
- is it, you know, something that
- you've actually come to quite easily? How would
- you describe that?
- It's been a journey.
- Obviously, my my wife made the decision long
- before I did and slowly getting acclimated
- to a plant forward lifestyle.
- I found the benefits of that
- both in my energy level as well
- as not getting cloudy headed
- after a
- a a really heavy midday meal.
- It it's just being mindful.
- I mean, at the end of the day,
- just wanna be mindful of what you're putting
- into your your body. But at this juncture,
- I'm I'm pretty used to it. So it
- wasn't a a hard lift once you get
- past
- the the routine of
- how you look at food and and how
- you, you know, start to look at it
- as energy more than anything else.
- Got it. Got it. And would you say
- that being vegan adjacent again, to use your
- term, but using the vegan plant forward lifestyle
- as a guide,
- it sounds like that would fit extremely well
- with the yoga and all its mindfulness
- teachings.
- How how well do you do you find
- those fitting together?
- I incredibly well.
- You know, the mindfulness in general is a
- tool. It's not the the only tool someone
- should have in their tool belt when they're
- trying to
- keep themselves both physically and emotionally balanced.
- I know other friends that love to run
- or or enjoy team sports.
- For me, it's I I tend to go
- inward. So anything where I can
- harness that mindfulness, breathing exercises.
- Truth be told, I'm not the best public
- speaker. I still get
- very nervous before speaking in front of crowds.
- Yoga has given me the the breathing techniques
- to kinda settle my nerves before I have
- to get in front of a crowd. So
- it all comes into play into the career
- as well.
- I'm sure you're not alone as far as,
- trepidation
- and public speaking are concerned, Jim, but I'm
- I'm glad that you're you're working on that.
- And it sounds like you're well on your
- way to to to mastering as best you
- can.
- Yeah. And then you had mentioned mentally as
- well. Yes.
- The one thing I I will say on
- that front is
- is just to continue to
- to learn,
- always be learning.
- I think some people think, oh, I've become
- president and CEO and you start to
- to coast a little bit, but
- the learning curve is so steep.
- Obviously, people can't see me on this podcast.
- I I took this job at 42,
- 44 now.
- That's really up to to be a presidency
- of a
- a hospital.
- I get dropped into an incredibly steep learning
- curve to go uphill from,
- board management,
- public speaking we mentioned before,
- different leadership tools and philosophies. So
- never stop learning.
- Always make sure that whatever you're doing, you're
- challenging yourself to see things from different perspectives
- or challenge your own perspective
- just to ensure that you're you're always mentally
- stimulated.
- Jim, that makes a ton of sense. And
- I'm glad you mentioned the learning curve as
- well as, your analogy, your your image that
- you painted for us of staying in the
- box,
- because that relates to my next question, which
- is when you have tough days because you're
- going to have them,
- where or to whom do you try to
- move forward? You mentioned, of course, the mindfulness
- and the mentors. So what specific examples of
- how you move forward
- stand out to you?
- Yeah. I mean, Chris, on the hardest days,
- you and
- I don't mean to say this and and
- freak anyone in my my own hospital
- out, but on the hardest days, I I
- go walk around the hospital.
- Walk the halls, round on the the floors,
- connect with the team members here.
- There's never gonna be a day in in
- my
- life or career
- that's gonna be as bad as,
- someone that's stressed out about stressed out about
- a loved one
- that's in the procedure room or
- someone that's recovering
- from
- open heart surgery.
- And
- if you want things to be put in
- perspective
- for you,
- when you're having a bad day,
- you'd see someone walking around
- the ICU
- making that first or second lap around the
- ICU as they're recovering and just getting back
- on their feet after having open heart surgery,
- you're gonna realize real quick that your day
- as a health care administrator is not going
- as bad as you you really think it
- is.
- And
- and you feed off of the the strength
- of the team,
- and
- you get that that levity,
- and and you push forward. But but, yeah,
- I I I walk around. Not all the
- time. So if I people are listening off
- from my hospital, and they see me walking
- around, I'm not having a stressful day,
- all the time. But but on the bad
- ones, I I I try to
- get up on my feet, walk around, and
- and gain a little bit of perspective.
- Yeah, Jim. Happy to to provide that. I'm
- glad you provided that disclaimer of, you know,
- say, hey. You know, just because you see
- Jim doesn't mean he's having a bad day.
- He's still approachable.
- And, you know, not all not all things
- are are going poorly for him. Certainly, that
- that's not always the case.
- Good to know, certainly. But, yeah, I I
- love the perspective that you have on just
- saying
- to yourself, hey. Let let me see
- what exactly
- is going on every day at this hospital,
- which which you know of. But to see
- it yeah. I I think a lot of,
- of our audience members would agree that it's
- a great place to get perspective on on
- your own. The
- philosophy here is smiles are contagious, and I
- I know that's the the same philosophy at
- a lot of other health care organizations.
- But if you can pass a smile along,
- it's gonna get returned to you. And in
- likelihood,
- both people are gonna pass that smile to
- someone else.
- So
- go downstairs, catch some smiles, and and try
- to feel better about the day.
- Great idea. Great idea, Jim.
- Alright. So my next question for you
- is simply, what is something that you've learned
- about yourself
- from working in health care?
- I mean, we touched on
- the the golden rule, which I think is,
- why I got into the health care in
- the first place and I I try to
- to live by that.
- The biggest takeaway probably is I'm a bad
- patient.
- I try to be a better patient. You
- know, working in health care is a very
- good reminder of how much you need to
- continue to go see your PCP,
- be mindful of your heart health,
- and get your annual screenings on everything. And
- I I think health care workers in general
- make bad patients. I am a particularly bad
- one. So,
- that I I've learned that real quick in
- in my twenty years of of being in
- health care, and I it's still a lesson
- I'm trying to improve upon every day.
- But but I ended up in health care
- by choice. Some of the first seven years
- of my career, I was with PricewaterhouseCoopers,
- and I was in their advisory practice
- and going around the country consulting on a
- bunch of different clients, whether it was banking
- or
- utilities,
- definitely a lot in the financial sector. But
- I started to work for healthcare organizations,
- And
- and I fell in love with it, not
- because of
- the subject matter, because you can build databases
- and do strategic planning,
- for for any sector,
- but because of the people.
- And the people in healthcare
- is what brought me
- into healthcare delivery, and where I get my
- job at Brigham and Women's Hospital after I
- left PwC.
- And
- it's something that I I learned about myself
- pretty early in my career is that I
- need to be surrounded by good people
- to be happy
- in what I'm doing. So the the
- GPS that I use when I I look
- at my own career is
- is what I'm doing,
- who I'm doing it with, and how I'm
- valued.
- And who I do it with is really
- important for me, and it's gotta be good
- humans first and foremost
- if I'm gonna be happy where I'm at
- in my career. And and I think that
- knowing that about myself
- has made a a big difference.
- Jim,
- how do you go about
- applying that philosophy
- to those who come into
- Deborah
- as
- whether they've been in health care for a
- long time or not?
- Again, you wanna treat people
- the way that you want to be treated.
- And if I just take those three things,
- of what they're doing,
- who they're doing it for,
- and and how they're valued.
- Everybody
- here at Deborah, there's over a thousand of
- us that work at our
- 94 bed
- independent
- specialty hospital,
- but all 1,000
- of them, I want them to be a
- three out of three.
- I want them to
- love what they're doing from a
- responsibility
- standpoint. I want them to
- love who they do it for
- from a organizational
- leadership perspective, but also for what this organization
- means in health care.
- We are
- carrying on a a mission of
- of caring for people in a manner that
- no one else does in the country,
- from a financial support standpoint.
- And
- and that's something that's bigger than all of
- us. And I want them to believe in
- that mission and and wanna
- further that mission because I think it's the
- the last vestige of what's great about health
- care now.
- And I want them to feel valued,
- whether that's extrinsically,
- and having fair and equitable wages or or
- intrinsically
- and them feeling hurt, like they're contributing to
- the direction of
- the organization.
- We just got done with
- a $100,000,000
- capital improvement
- project, which
- upgraded all the rooms across the hospital to
- individual patient rooms. And,
- we built a mock room down in the
- cafeteria,
- and we let all of our employees put
- post its notes. We have post its from
- the EVS team around, oh, this is gonna
- be too tight for me to really work
- with them. We had post its from the
- nursing team that says, you know, when the
- nozzles were here for the oxygen, it really
- gets in the way of,
- what we're trying to do, and and we
- let the team design
- the new space for our patients. And I
- think as a result of that,
- both the team's happier, and they see that
- their input is
- is heard and seen. You just gotta do
- that every single day, three hundred and sixty
- five days a year.
- Seems like a very simple,
- straightforward, but no doubt very powerful and effective,
- message and method that you have at Devora
- Gym.
- Finally, my question last question for you is,
- and and certainly one risk that you've taken
- that's paid off
- is coming to health care in particular.
- But whether it's that
- or another risk,
- what do you look back on your life,
- your career, and say, you know what? I'm
- so glad I made that decision.
- Not to sound
- sound corny, but, I will I will say
- this because
- I think if you talk to
- most CEOs,
- most of their risks are gonna have to
- have paid off. Right? You don't get necessarily,
- to
- to,
- levels in your career
- unless
- a lot of things align
- and and everything works out. So,
- I
- I wouldn't have any alignment,
- if not for
- taking a risk and going on a blind
- date,
- to meet a girl fifteen years ago and
- and found a
- a partner in in my health care journey.
- She my wife is also a health care
- administrator.
- But, you know, without that risk, I wouldn't
- have the support structure
- or
- the the ability to to balance myself at
- home and and have that same,
- you know,
- value of of what I was trying to
- do in my career,
- if not for taking that risk. Right? But,
- you know, that that was the biggest. It
- allowed me to have the strength and the
- support
- to to take all the other risks, going
- from
- Brigham and Women's Hospital to
- RWJBarnes
- Health in Northern New Jersey
- to take
- a a broader scope in my career and
- and really dive into service lines at a
- scale given the size of that health care
- system,
- that isn't really
- can't really be found,
- in many places in the country,
- to
- shifting from service lines to becoming a
- a president and CEO of a of a
- hospital, which was a a different type of
- set of tools that you have to have
- in your career than just being a service
- line leader.
- Wouldn't have been able to do any of
- that, if not for for rolling the dice
- and and going out for a drink.
- Fifteen years ago
- after I ended my shift at the hospital,
- to to meet a girl at a bar
- in Boston. Sounds very goodwill hunting, but it
- that is, the truth of it.
- Well, Jim, let those who would call it
- corny call it that. Who cares, really? It's
- it's led you to this
- wonderful journey that you've had in in health
- care. Thank you so much for sharing, you
- know, your mentor. Shout out again to your
- teacher who put that,
- you know, how to win friends and influence
- people.
- Book in your hand. You know, you said
- you're a bad patient, but you're learning. It's
- all part about part of the learning process
- in health care. Yeah. Just thank you for
- sharing your your philosophy and and how you've
- applied that to your career.
- Thank you, Chris. I really appreciate the opportunity.
- Thank you to Beckers. Thank you to the
- team here at the Borah Hart Law Center.
- Fantastic, Tim. And we'll see you come
- this fall, I believe. Yeah. Absolutely.
- I'm very excited for the
- for the meeting, so I will be there
- to join you all. Wonderful. Thanks, Jim. Alright.
- Thank you, Chris.