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This is where health care leadership comes together.

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Becker's sixteenth annual meeting brings more than 3,500

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hospital and health system executives and nearly 800

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speakers to Chicago

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April.

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This year's event includes keynote conversations with Dallas

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Cowboys legend Troy Aikman and former president George

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w Bush. For the agenda and event details,

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visit beckershospitalreview.com

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and click on the events tab in the

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upper right. We're looking forward to hosting you

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in Chicago.

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Hello, everyone, and welcome to the Becker's Healthcare

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podcast. I'm Scott King, thrilled today to be

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joined by a very special guest, Disha k

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Brown, senior director, community clinics network operations over

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at UCLA Health. Disha, how are you? Thanks

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so much for joining us.

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I'm doing well, Scott. Thank you so much

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for having me.

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Of course. Of course. And, you know, we

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have a lot of of big topics in

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health care to to lean on you for

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to answer for us just a little bit.

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Before you do that, I was hoping you

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can give us a little bit about a

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little information about your background and your career

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in health care.

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Absolutely. Absolutely.

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So, Scott, currently, I serve as the senior

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director of community clinics operations

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here at UCLA Health, and I've been in

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this role now for a little bit over

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a year and a half. I have

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close to,

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twenty years of health care operations

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experience. And currently here at UCLA,

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I have the privilege

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of leading over 200 community clinics

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that delivers care to diverse communities across seven

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regions.

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Our clinics are often the front door

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to our health system, and the work that

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we do every day is centered on

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one simple but powerful mission,

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and that is healing with human kindness one

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patient at a time. And I like to

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think that what makes our organization special is

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not just the scale of what we do,

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but the intentional focus on bringing high quality

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academic level care

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closer to where patients live, work, and raise

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their families.

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Through our community clinic footprint,

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we see approximately

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close to a million outpatient visits a year.

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And so we're expanding

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access and advancing population health and really building

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care models that are increasingly

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team based and patient centered.

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For me personally,

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the work is deeply meaningful because it sits

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at the intersection

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of leadership,

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operational

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excellence, and community service. And so this is

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what drives me and continues to inspire me

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to do the work that I do every

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day.

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Thanks so much, Disha, for sharing your background

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info there. And and, yeah, I I think

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it's it's such a great, approach to focus

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on just, you know, one patient at a

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time. I think you end up helping so

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many people that way. So thank you for

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sharing that as well. And, you know, I

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I want to start by

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getting to the topics and asking you, what

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was the most important initiative you led in

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the last year? You know, what did you

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do for that initiative, and what were the

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results?

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You know, as I reflect over the last

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year and especially being new to UCLA,

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it is a little difficult for me to

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point to just

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one initiative.

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Leadership,

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I believe, in a complex health care system

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requires

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balancing

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the immediate operational realities while also trying to

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advance

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long term strategic priorities, and I often refer

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to this as the duality of leadership.

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When I stepped into my role,

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over a year and a half ago, I

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established six leadership

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imperatives

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to guide the trajectory

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of my leadership platform.

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And some of those

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imperatives included strengthening our leadership teams,

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integrated collaboration,

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governance, standardizing

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processes,

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team cohesion,

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and just building

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a more results driven culture.

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Unfortunately,

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I had to shift focus. Within

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nine months of me being here at UCLA

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Health, we were faced with an unexpected

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crisis

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during the LA fires,

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And I'm sure everyone

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remembers and recall what a difficult time period

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that was across,

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Los Angeles and Los Angeles County.

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My immediate focus at that time was ensuring

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the safety

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of our staff, patients, and operational

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assets.

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Unfortunately, during that time, we did lose,

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one of our

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facilities.

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But, thankfully, due to quick action and just

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quick leadership

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of the people we had on the ground

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and leading our clinics, no lives were lost.

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And I'm very, very grateful for that because

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certainly that remained

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my highest priority to ensure that our staff

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and our patients were safe.

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If I step back and think a little

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bit more, I would also

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highlight the fact that over the past year,

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we were able to continue advancing

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one of our population health strategies that was

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extremely

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important.

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I co champion an initiative to help improve

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hypertension management

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across our community clinic footprint,

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and this focused on repeat blood pressure checks

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for patients that were presenting with elevated

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readings.

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Our performance improved

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by approximately

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thirty percent in a very short period of

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time

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between July and December, and our fiscal year

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is not over. And so I'm super excited

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about the achievements

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of the work that we've done in regard

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to this metric and in regard to this

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particular population because it represents

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meaningful progress in reducing long term cardiovascular

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risk for the population that we serve. In

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addition to that, I just learned this week,

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and I'm even more excited about it, that

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an abstract we submitted,

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in regard to this work was selected

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for the Society of Internal General Medicine conference,

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presentation

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in May. So I'm super excited about it.

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And as I think about

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both of these

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areas over the past year, the experience demonstrates

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to me our ability to navigate crisis

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while still delivering

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measurable

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health outcomes.

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Yeah. Yeah. Thank you for sharing that. You

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know, it's unfortunate to hear that a a

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facility was lost, but but, you know, it's

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nice to hear that everyone kinda banded together

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and everyone was okay and and just, you

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know,

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a great great leadership got you guys through

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that crisis, it sounds like. And I kinda

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wanna go back to something

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you said about leadership.

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In your introduction, I think you kinda broke

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down your role as as focusing on leadership,

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operational excellence, and community service. And what I

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wanna ask you is is out of

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those kind of three sectors you divided your

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role into, do you think that leadership

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is the most important? Because, obviously, good leadership

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leads to good operational excellence and good community

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service.

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Absolutely. At the end of the day, regardless

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of whether we're talking about being

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results driven or being more people centered

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or even focusing on improving patient experience, at

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the end of the day,

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it all connects back to leadership.

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And that is why leadership

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became one of my

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first imperatives to focus on in regard to

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ensuring that our leaders,

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are strong and they're presenting strong and that

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they have what they need to succeed in

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their roles.

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Absolutely. And and leadership will get you through

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a a crisis like you just shared with

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us, and and you'll

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able to learn from that crisis.

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Absolutely. Like that again.

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Yes. Absolutely.

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And so the thing I wanna ask you

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is, what is what is the hardest thing

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you'll have to do in the coming year,

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you think?

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I think for me, the hardest thing that

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I would have to do is continue to

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focus on leading sustained

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culture change.

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Strategy

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definitely

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is essential,

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but culture, I think, at the end of

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the day, ultimately determines

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whether strategy succeeds.

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And culture change

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is very difficult, and I often say, as

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leaders, we must learn to do hard things.

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We have to, and we have to lean

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into it. And and

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change can be certainly hard, and it requires

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consistency

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and certainly

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a lot of courage and patience at the

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same time, as well as, I believe it

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means, holding ourselves accountable

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to the behaviors

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we say we value

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and how we live up to those behaviors

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even when it is uncomfortable

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and staying committed to the long game despite

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competing priorities.

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I often say I believe the real work

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of leadership

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is often unseen.

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It's not just achieving operational wins,

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but building environments where excellence becomes the norm.

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I think this level of transformation

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requires intentional effort every day,

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and I see that as both the greatest

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challenge

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and the greatest opportunity ahead.

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Disha, where do you see the best opportunities

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for organizational

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growth?

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You know, I am incredibly

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fortunate to be part of an organization

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like UCLA Health whose vision centers on healing

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with human kindness. And as demand for care

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continues to grow,

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access remains one of our greatest opportunities.

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I have this joke that I say all

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the time that, oh my gosh, I wish

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I had a garden so I could grow

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more physicians.

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It seems that we cannot simply hire enough

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physicians to meet the demand. So we must

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become smarter

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about how we design our care delivery models

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and focus on

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advanced team based models and optimizing the roles

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of all of our,

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providers and our clinical staff and even being

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able to leverage technology thoughtfully.

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I believe that if we can do that,

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when we build systems that are efficient,

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team based, and people centered, we can expand

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access and improve outcomes

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and at the same time,

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position the organization for long term sustainable growth.

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And, Disha, I think you have such a

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great perspective on on leadership and and what

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good leadership you know, what that entails in

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health care. I I want to to close

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this by asking you, how do you think

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you evolved as a leader?

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I

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think, you know, when you're starting out as

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a as a young leader, at some point,

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it it really appears to be daunting. It's

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like you're looking at the mountain.

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I was fortunate that throughout my leadership career

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and I began my

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experience in health care with the department of

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veteran affairs, I have the opportunity

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to really grow through various leadership platforms

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and trainings.

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In addition to that,

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matriculating

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through various senior positions,

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I think, also prepared me very, very well.

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And also facing that duality of leadership, trying

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to balance crisis while at the same time

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focusing on operational

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goals and initiatives.

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I think what has developed me the most

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as a leader is my commitment to being

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people centered

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and focusing on the human element

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of this work that we do every day.

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I I believe so much of what we

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do, especially in health care, but especially in

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a senior leadership role is human centered, and

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we must connect to the human element in

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order to drive operational excellence.

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Yeah. I think it's such an important point

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as we deal with emerging technology, you know,

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in health care now to to to make

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sure we're staying people focused. I think it's

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a a great perspective. And, Disha, thank you

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so much for a great conversation and for

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joining us on the podcast. Look forward to

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working with you again soon. Thank you. It's

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certainly been my pleasure.