1. Healthcare
Operational
Excellence Executive
Sector Meeting
Sector Participants
VP Patient Care & CNO
HARDIN MEMORIAL HEALTH
SVP Operational Transformation
HARRIS HEALTH SYSTEM
COO
BAPTIST HEALTH SYSTEM
CEO
HUNT MEMORIAL HOSPITAL
October 22-24, 2017
Hilton Dallas Plano
Dallas, TX
@ConnexHC | #ConnexHC | www.connexpartners.com
CNO
ROME MEMORIAL HOSPITAL
COO
BAYLOR UNIVERSITY
MEDICAL CENTER
COO
EFFINGHAM HEALTH SYSTEM
COO
METHODIST NORTH HOSPITAL
Area CEO
PROMISE HEALTHCARE
CEO & Chairman
NORTH CYPRESS
MEDICAL CENTER
President
OSS HEALTH
COO
JERSEY CITY MEDICAL CENTER
COO
MEMORIAL HOSPITAL
VP, Operations
ST JUDE MEDICAL CENTER
Chief Medical Officer
RICE MEMORIAL HOSPITAL
Operational Efficiency
Organizational Transformation
Leadership Excellence
VP, Operations
UNIVERSITY OF PENNSYLVANIA
HEALTH SYSTEM
VP, Operations
AURORA HEALTH CARE
CEO
BAYLOR COLLEGE OF MEDICINE
COMMUNITY PATHOLOGY
CAO
MARSHFIELD CLINIC
HEALTH SYSTEM
COO
HOLTZ CHILDREN’S & JACKSON
WOMEN’S HOSPITAL
Administrator
DAVIS HOSPITAL & MEDICAL CENTER
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Why Attend?
Maximize Your Time
The Healthcare Operational
Excellence Executive Sector
Meeting is designed specifically
for senior executives for whom
time is a limited and important
resource.
The unique format allows each
participant to create their own
customized itinerary, focused
only on relevant issues and topics.
This guarantees that participants
are able to take away the
information they need to meet
their current goals and concerns.
By beginning the event on
Sunday afternoon and ending
at lunchtime on Tuesday, we
limit time out of the office to a
maximum of two days, including
travel.
Find Solutions and Get
Proven Results
The focus over these two days
is on identifying and deeply
exploring strategies and tactics
that have proven to be effective.
The Healthcare Operational
Excellence Executive Sector
Meeting puts you in close contact
with executives from similar
organizations to your own, many
of whom have implemented
- or chosen not to implement -
strategies that you’re currently
evaluating.
This allows you to leverage the
wisdom of your direct peers,
getting candid insights on best
practices and common pitfalls
- the sort of information that is
seldom available publicly.
Reliable and Actionable
Information Developed
by Senior Healthcare
Executives
We provide unbiased content
developed by other senior
healthcare executives. We do not
accept sponsorship dollars to
allow vendors to speak on our
platform in any capacity. Solution
providers are represented only at
the most senior level and in very
small numbers. Furthermore,
they are not permitted to attend
any of the closed-door discussion
sessions.
Intimate and High-Level
Networking to Create
Strategic and Long-Term
Relationships
All executives selected to attend
the Meeting must meet specific
qualifying criteria. To optimize
networking opportunities
and your ability to build
meaningful new relationships,
we intentionally cap attendance
at 60. Peer-to-peer interactions
consist of small group sessions,
think tanks, and one-on-one
meetings.
Amy Wilder
Tel: (646) 502-8874
Email: awilder@connexpartners.com
For speaking and participation
opportunities, please contact:
Operational Efficiency | Organizational Transformation | Leadership Excellence
Healthcare Operational Excellence Executive Sector Meeting
“The opportunity to discuss current issues
and real solutions was great.”
LISA ELLIS, COO
Oklahoma State University Medical Center
“The Think Tank model was very, very
powerful for me personally.”
BRUCE CLEMENT, COO
Slidell Memorial Hospital
3. @ConnexHC | #ConnexHC | www.connexpartners.com3
Advisor
Dr. James Robinson
President & CEO
Presence St Joseph
Hospital-Chicago
Advisor
Jose Sanchez
President & CEO
Norwegian
American Hospital
Advisor
Kimberly Montes
SVP & Corporate
Chief Clinical Officer
Promise Healthcare
Advisor
Bruce Elegant
President & CEO
Rush Oak Park
Hospital
Advisory Board & Thought Leaders
Advisor
Jaelyn Richard
Administrator
Lourdes Physician
Group
Advisor
Dr. Sarah Humme
CNO/COO
Southwest General
Hospital
Advisor
Lewis Perkins
VP Patient Care
Services & CNO
Norton Hospital
Advisor
Daniel Brazell
CEO
La Peer Health
Systems
Advisor
Jonathan Jean-Marie
VP & Hospital
Administrator
Loma Linda
University Health
Darmita Wilson
COO
Providence
Hospital -
Ascension Health
Systems
Don Martin
SVP & CAO
Phoebe Putney
Health System
Rick Smith
COO
Health Central
Hospital - Orlando
Health
Advisor
Michael Collins
Chief Clinical Officer
& Chief Nursing
Officer
Vibra Hospital
Matt Troup
CEO
Conway Regional
Health System
Advisor
Jennifer Dunphy
VP, Population
Health
Regal Medical
Group
Advisor
Rhonda Thompson
CNO
CHRISTUS Health
Children’s Hospital
of San Antonio
Christopher O’Connell
Divisional Chief of
Ambulatory Medicine
& Chief Experience
Officer
Henry Ford Macomb
Hospital
Kenneth Cochran
President & CEO
Opelousas General
Health System
Michael Pizzano
CEO
Kindred Hospital
of New Jersey
Deborah Grimes
Chief Diversity
Officer
UAB
Deneen Richmond
VP, Performance
Improvement &
Outcomes
Inova Health System
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Think Tank Sessions|Off the record, small group conversations
What is a Think Tank?
It’s you and 15 of your industry peers in a room who are each dealing with challenges similar to your own – so what’s the first
question that comes to mind? Many participants find Think Tanks amongst the most honest and practical peer-to-peer conversations
they have had, in terms of finding innovative and insightful new ideas, ways of thinking and operating. In a Connex Think Tank, each
participant can elicit, discuss and analyze their most effective strategies and ideas as directly and honestly as possible; going well
beyond the obvious in terms of what is really working, what hasn’t and crucially - why.
Hospital Violence: Staff and Patient Safety
Safety is not just a patient issue – it affects your staff and visi-
tors as well. The recent opioid epidemic has shone a light on the
needs of healthcare facilities as it relates to Hospital Violence
– whether it stems from Behavioral Health, Drug Addiction
or other reasons – the imperative cannot be overlooked. What
initiatives can you put in place to ensure that your facility is
‘best in breed’?
This group will address challenges such as:
• How does your State or locality address issues of violence
within healthcare facilities? What internal guidelines have
you put in place to address this challenge?
• When little or no guidelines have been offered from Lo-
cal, State or the Federal Government – what options do
we have at our disposal to ensure the safety of our pa-
tients, our employees, and visitors?
Leadership & Board Room Politics: Building Credibility
Applying ‘best practices’ isn’t merely about learning from our failures,
but understanding how to identify the opportunities that present them-
selves thereafter. Developing a sound and structured working relation-
ship with your Board will help to facilitate and drive new initiatives and
ensure that you are maximizing both your value and your impact. But
in order to do so – building credibility with your board is of paramount
importance. While we rarely want to speak openly about our failures –
they are often where we stand to gain the most knowledge and under-
standing for future endeavors and initiatives.
This group will address challenges such as:
• What is the best makeup for healthcare boards today? What about
having “community representation”?
• When you are the sole driver of culture change, how do you drive
this change with the board? This requires risk taking, so how do
you work in an environment of uncertainty? How do you over-
come the fear of failure?
• How do you work in an environment of uncertainty? How do you
overcome the fear of failure?
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Think Tank Sessions|Off the record, small group conversations
The State of the Union: Healthcare in the Next 2-3 Years
As we become accustomed to the new Administration in Washington
– we have to begin understanding and addressing the challenges that
will be posed by potential changes in the regulatory regime. During
recent years changes in commercial health insurance have empow-
ered the health care consumer, non-traditional competitors have
joined the industry and setting the new competitive standard. Every
day there are more headlines regarding hospital operating incomes
decreasing, hospitals reducing service offerings, etc… Understanding
the drivers and implications of any regulatory changes and how to
proceed in a risk mitigation scenario are undoubtedly at the forefront
of your mind.
This group will address challenges such as:
• How will the new Administration address issues that directly
affect your company’s bottom line?
• What are the business implications of Washington’s policies;
What do we know? What don’t we know? How do we set our-
selves up for success?
• How might ACA repeal & replace affect you and your business?
How do you foresee the relationship between your organization
and regulatory agencies changing?
• What other challenges/ opportunities might present themselves
in the near future?
• What initiatives can we put in place today in order to prepare
for unforeseen circumstances stemming from regulatory chang-
es? How do we mitigate our risk?
• What safety net strategies can we apply?
Service Excellence & Patient Engagement
It is indisputable that communication is the key to improving
the quality of patient care and many organizations are using
outreach and engagement programs with great success. So
think about this for a moment – How exactly do you engage
with your customers? Of course, there are a number of ways
to achieve satisfactory customer experience scores – but can
you honestly say that your Patients are engaged with you?
We have the opportunity to develop a new understanding of
what the patient experience is, and what exactly our patients
expect from us - so that we can provide service that is second
to none.
This group will address challenges such as:
• How do we currently communicate with our patients?
How should we?
• How do our patients wish to be communicated with?
Why would they engage with us at all?
• Is it possible to re-establish the ‘Patient/Provider’ rela-
tionship? Can we expand it?
• Can we rebuild that 1-on-1 relationship for the 21st
Century?
• How can we transform ‘data’ into ‘intelligence’? Who is
in charge of that process?
• What can we learn from the ‘Ritz Carlton Way’? How do
we develop a ‘Connection Culture’ with our patients?
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Think Tank Sessions|Off the record, small group conversations
Next Generation ACOs: Services, System Implementations &
Infrastructure
We need to continue to be proactive. Within a few years the ACO has
gone from being a concept to a concrete example of next-generation
healthcare delivery. The development of ACOs was the first step – but
where do we go from here? In order to drive the discussions so inte-
gral to defining the future of the healthcare; engaging the necessary
stakeholders is but one step of many. For our sake, and that of our
patients, we cannot allow others to define the direction of healthcare
for us – we must take on that responsibility and do so with the ut-
most integrity. Quality and cost improvements will continue to drive
the growth of the ACO model – but what additional benefits can we
derive and what does the ACO 2.0 look like?
This group will address challenges such as:
• Through what means can we drive the direction that healthcare
will take?
• How do COOs, CNOs and other top-level Executives assist in
defining that strategy in a world moving inexorably towards a
more robust Digital Health service offering? What exactly will
healthcare look like?
• What pitfalls and additional challenges should you expect and
how do you mitigate their long-term impact?
• What metrics are you tracking as a facility? What metrics must
be added to that as an ACO?
• What are the readiness benchmarks? What standards exist and
at what level?
• How will we fill the gaps?
Physician Reviews: Metrics & Analysis
As data proliferates and provides additional perspective with
which to view healthcare – utilizing the right metrics in physi-
cian reviews is imperative to ensuring that physicians fall with-
in a certain expected standard. Metrics such as case volume,
cost of staff or supplies per case & infection rates – are par for
the course – but what other metrics are you tracking and how
are you applying them?
This group will address challenges such as:
• What additional metrics do you utilize to review your
physicians? What analysis have you derived?
• What innovative metrics have you brought to bear?
• Do you track patient satisfaction or handwashing compli-
ance?
• How do you define the level of impact of a transgression
of basic safety?
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Think Tank Sessions|Off the record, small group conversations
Opioid Addiction: Addressing the Challenges of a Growing
Epidemic
We can no longer sit quietly by as the Opioid epidemic continues to
ravage our nation. As opioid addiction among Americans continues
to rise – the effects upon our society, and our Hospitals, are striking.
More and more Healthcare professionals are finding themselves in
difficult positions as they are tasked with addressing related challeng-
es in Hospitals, Clinics and Emergency rooms nation-wide. But what
has been done and what can be done to address this national impera-
tive?
This group will address challenges such as:
• How wide-spread is this epidemic? What measures or internal
guidelines have you put in place to address this challenge?
• What more can be done at the Facility/System level?
• What sort of legislation exists in your State? What more would
you like to see done at the State/Federal level?
Population Health: Using your Data to Impact
Outcomes via Diversity & Cultural Training
What does your data tell you? What have you been able to
infer regarding the demographics of your facility/system and
the outcome and quality of care they receive? As we all know,
there are some different health challenges when we are divided
by Gender – but how do ethnicity, people with disabilities, and
other demographic differences come into play?
This group will address challenges such as:
• How can you use diversity training to improve quality
and outcomes for underrepresented populations?
• What kind of training must you implement? What does
that training look like?
• What data must you track in order to ensure that you
have actionable intelligence?
• Through what means can you benchmark with other
organizations? States?
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Think Tank Sessions|Off the record, small group conversations
Addressing Employee Burnout: Setting-Up Staff for Success
“Make no mistake about it; there’s no hope of achieving a sustainable,
high-value healthcare system for our patients if we’re dealing with a
workforce that’s not sustainable — personally and professionally.” –
Dr. John Noseworthy, President & CEO of Mayo Clinic
A national survey conducted in 2011 (updated in 2014) by Mayo
Clinic exposed that some 54 percent of physicians in the United
States are experiencing some level of ‘burnout’ in their work. Ac-
cording to the research, the evidence suggests that burnout precedes
poorer care, higher physician turnover, and an overall decline in the
quality of care provided by the healthcare system.
This group will address challenges such as:
• What initiatives have you put in place in order to address this
challenge?
• Can we successfully reduce the level of burnout, despite the
shortage in qualified workforce?
• What positions are most at risk and how can we mitigate the
‘burnout effect’?
• What novel approaches have you applied in your organization
that has borne fruit?
Addressing Waste and Care Variation: Cutting Costs
As we all know – standardization helps to provide economies
of scale and economies of scale help to decrease costs and rid
the system of unwanted waste. Due to the increasing complex-
ity of healthcare in the US; we are finding that a significant
amount of waste in the system (some 42% of wasted healthcare
spending) stems from some 16% of physicians. How can we
solve this problem and come to grips with both our rising costs
and significant waste?
This group will address challenges such as:
• How do you integrate a waste mitigation strategy through
reduced care variation?
• If the reduction of care variation isn’t a possibility – what
other methods do you have at your disposal?
• What sorts of cost reductions can you find?
• How do you structure a response to care variation that
includes the perspectives of all parties involved? How do
you integrate that into the existing reporting structure?
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Think Tank Sessions|Off the record, small group conversations
Business Intelligence: Data & Analytics
The adoption of new technology and data analytics can allow you
to find ways to capture more money out of the revenue cycle as well
as implement clinical care redesign efforts such as standardization
and utilization improvement. In order to improve population health
management, the patient experience, and clinical integration to gain
a better understanding of healthcare consumers, it is important to
focus on clinical IT, EHR interoperability, and predictive analytics.
This group will address challenges such as:
• How can data and analytics be leveraged to make better deci-
sions?
• Which other facilities have internalized data and analytics?
What have you seen as a success, and conversely, any obstacles?
If you were to do it again, would you do it the same way? For
those who outsourced, what are benefits? Obstacles? Would you
do the same way? What opportunities have been gathered from
either approach?
• How are you providing data and analytic support for clinicians
and administrators regarding decision making about program
and service performance?
• Describe ways your organization is gaining operational efficien-
cies through workforce productivity improvement, supply chain
management, and portfolio management.
Patient Throughput & Progressive Care
In an era of continued change in the healthcare space; with
decreasing reimbursements and increasing costs – developing
sound, efficient and functional strategies to maximize physical
space and improve outcomes cannot be overstated. Improving
patient throughput can have profound implications on effec-
tive bed capacity, patient access, service levels and your bottom
line. But how do you achieve these successes? And what pitfalls
should you be aware of?
This group will address challenges such as:
• How does your organization define patient throughput?
What program have you put in place in your facility/sys-
tem to date? What measurable outcomes have you seen?
• When designing a patient throughput program – what
implications must you be cognizant of? How do you
properly build out that program?
• What related costs should you keep in mind?
• How will a patient throughput program affect your phys-
ical facility? Do you need to make changes to your facili-
ty’s layout?
• Who must be involved in those conversations and who
‘owns’ this project?
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Think Tank Sessions|Off the record, small group conversations
Cost Controls: Bending the Curve
As Providers do their utmost to provide quality care to their
patients; Providers are looking for ways to minimize their
exposure in this changing industry. As Patients become more
savvy but continue to disengage from a system seemingly
becoming more complicated day by day – we find ourselves at
a crossroads in the Healthcare industry. We know that our cur-
rent course is unsustainable – but our efforts to reform it have
provided benefits in many areas – without actually reigning in
costs. Join us for a conversation on the fundamental nature of
American Healthcare as we understand the challenges that we
face and what must be done to affect meaningful change.
This group will address challenges such as:
• Is it possible to find common ground among all major
players in the industry? Including Providers, Payers and
Patients?
• What unique role does NFP Hospitals/Clinics play? How
can we – as a society – ensure that their mission is our
mission?
• How do you improve Patient Care while bending the cost
curve?
• How do you prepare for changes in an uncertain regu-
latory environment? What burdens might they impose
upon you? How do you prepare for changes that you
cannot foresee?
• How do you differentiate from ‘wants’ and ‘needs’ in your
facility/system?
Volume-to-Value is Failing: Here’s Why, and How to Stay Afloat
You cannot attend a conference, a symposium, listen to a webinar, or
read a blog post without hearing people talk about volume-to-value.
Or, if you are a provider or payor, even worse, having a vendor try to
sell you a product that will lead you to volume-to-value nirvana. But,
what does this really mean? Healthcare is replete with the excessive use
of simple terms as the answer to all problems, without actually having a
transparent discussion about effectiveness or application in real-world
settings. It is not the idea of volume-to-value that is misaligned. In-
stead, it is the implementation.
This group will address challenges such as:
• How is volume-to-value misaligned?
• When volume-to-value was developed – why was the payment
model for payers and providers not revised accordingly?
Plan B: Addressing Cyber Breaches & PHI Theft
The Challenge of Cyber-Security as it relates to the healthcare industry
has been gaining in importance over the past years – especially regard-
ing recently mandated EMRs and the profusion of Ransomware attacks
focused at Healthcare facilities world-wide. With the increasing prev-
alence of data, and especially PHI – understanding our adversaries is
the only way to ensure that we are keeping our patients, facilities and
our broader healthcare system safe from harm. But what happens when
things go awry? What is your back-up plan?
This group will address challenges such as:
• What exactly is Ransomware? How can it impact our businesses?
• How can you identify the extent of the breach?
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General Sessions
What is a General Session?
Take a deep-dive into the topics below through the eyes of one of your peers as they explain ‘what’, ‘how’, ‘where’ and ‘how much’.
This is your ‘talking head’ session – lucky for you, that ‘talking head’ is an industry guru!
Is Your Healthcare Infrastructure Ready for Value-Based
Healthcare?
As a starting point, value-based healthcare will require collaboration
across departments, advanced population health analytics, com-
munity care coordination, and patient empowerment – all for the
purpose of more in-depth reporting and restructuring the metrics
needed to calculate reimbursements and increase the quality of care
for patients. But developing the right infrastructure in order to drive
the direction that care coordination will take, especially with regards
to chronic conditions, is easier said than done. Capitalizing on in-
centives provided by Government must also be carefully considered
and applied. What must you do to provide direction to this already
daunting task?
My Long Walk Home: Disappointment, Retribution and
my Role in the Future of Healthcare
Some of you may know my story; others may not. As a young
and dynamic Hospital CEO with a unique perspective on my
role and the industry – I have successfully seized the opportu-
nities that have come my way, learned from the challenges that
have crossed my path, and become a stronger leader because of
it. From professional set-backs, to new prospects. From disap-
pointment to retribution. Learn from Michael Pizzano – the
CEO of Kindred Hospital New Jersey - Morris County - about
his journey, how it defines his current role and perspective, and
how that perspective is driving change and improvements at
Kindred.
This session will address:
• Michael’s unique background and set-backs and how
those set-backs prepared him for his current role as
CEO of Kindred Hospital New Jersey – Morris County
• Discuss with Michael his perspective on the role of the
CEO, the Healthcare industry, and the areas within
which he is affecting change at Kindred
• Explore the initiatives that Michael and his team have
implemented in order to improve patient experience,
quality of care and outcomes
Physician Leadership: Engaging & Operating within an
Integrated Healthcare System
How do you define Leadership? What are the characteristics of a
Leader? ‘Leadership’ and ‘Management’ are often confused when it
comes to the nature of those attributes. But how do you engage with
Physicians and have them take on a Leadership role within an in-
tegrated healthcare system? Of course, there is no silver bullet; but
there are proven methods!
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Panel Discussions
What is a Panel Discussion?
You know how this works! A few really smart people on-stage providing you with perspective that you have either - never heard of,
never thought of, or wish you came up with!
The State of the Union: Healthcare in the Next 2-3 Years
As we become accustomed to the new Administration in Washington
– we have to begin understanding and addressing the challenges that
will be posed by potential changes in the regulatory regime. During
recent years changes in commercial health insurance have empowered
the health care consumer, non-traditional competitors have joined the
industry and setting the new competitive standard. Every day there are
more headlines regarding hospital operating incomes decreasing, hospi-
tals reducing service offerings, M&A etc. Understanding the drivers and
implications of any regulatory & market changes and how to proceed in a
risk mitigation scenario are undoubtedly at the forefront of your mind.
This panel will address challenges such as:
• What are the business implications of Washington’s policies;
What do we know? What don’t we know? How do we set our-
selves up for success?
• How might changes to ACA – or a full repeal & replace - affect
you and your business? How do you foresee the relationship
between your organization and regulatory agencies changing?
• What market conditions are directly impacting your organiza-
tion? How are you capitalizing?
• How are you measured and compensated under a population
health, value-based reimbursement model?
The Corporatization of Hospitals: From M&A to
Functional Integration
During recent years – there have been profound shifts within
the healthcare industry. We have continued to witness increas-
ing consolidation of hospitals and systems; when the industry
started out as community-led and University-based facilities.
But despite all of this change – we still cling to an outdated view
of what healthcare is; and what it should be. By understanding
that our healthcare isn’t provided in the same way that it was
20 years ago – we can affect additional change with regards to
increasing industry consolidation.
This panel will address challenges such as:
• How do you define the right structure for your facility/
system? Should you develop a more centralized structure
or decentralize your configuration?
• How do you identify the right opportunity and form of
collaboration? M&As, Co-ops, ACOs, JVs, etc…
• How can you ensure that the M&A process is handled
with care - so that patients and staff alike are properly
considered?
• How do you ensure positive collaboration from all par-
ties? Internal and External alike?
