Bridge the gap in hospital IT, clinician and executive communication: Q&A with Prime Healthcare CIO Will Conaway

Will Conaway joined Prime Healthcare, based in Ontario, Calif., in 2018 after serving in leadership roles at Dignity Health.

 

While at Dignity, Mr. Conaway was responsible for the strategy and operations of IT and healthcare services. After becoming CIO of Prime Healthcare, Mr. Conaway has focused on changing the culture of IT to focus more on the patient experience. Here, he discusses the big initiatives he is working on and the strategy behind them.

Question: What initiative are you most proud of leading at your hospital or health system?

Will Conaway: I am most proud of leading the cultural shift in how Prime Healthcare's information technology division functions, serves its customers and strives to achieve improved patient outcomes. There is a significant amount of planning, implementing and maintaining to be a world class IT department, and I have been very fortunate to inherit many good leaders. It makes it much easier when you have people who are extremely capable already in place.

Upon joining Prime Healthcare, our first item of business was to define our direction. We returned to the basics, aligning IT with the values, goals, and mission of the organization as a whole. This effort is time intensive and takes constant and consistent communication to spark improvements, particularly in our large IT department, where we span 45 hospitals, 14 U.S. states and two continents. I've been able to draw heavily from my experiences of teaching leadership and the psychology of leadership to hundreds of individuals and groups from organizations including Amazon, J.P. Morgan, American Express and Marriott, to name a few.

Understanding psychology and how to apply it in a business setting is critical for any leader who wants to witness success. I dedicate at least one hour a day reading how successful leaders have achieved success. You must continue to educate yourself to stay valid at work. I've learned a great deal from reading the strategic thinking of some of my favorite leaders, including Gen. Patton, Peter F. Drucker and Allan Filipowicz, and I especially enjoy stories of how great sports coaches went about building their winning programs. Three essential items that I’ve added to my philosophy are from former college football Hall of Fame coach Bill Snyder:

1. Expect to Win — and truly believe we will.
2. Leadership — everyone can set the example.
3. No self-limitations — expect more of yourself.

A leader should never be ashamed or embarrassed about going back to the basics. You need the fundamental building blocks in place before you can witness success. Leadership should not be about a 100 percent inward focus on yourself; it's about focusing on the objectives and making your people better.

Q: How do you set a culture of communication between the IT, clinical and executive leaders at your hospital or health system?

WC: A culture of communication is an ongoing process. It's easy for clinical and executive leaders to see IT as communications and operational roadblocks since, to them, technology is somewhat of a foreign language that's filled with strange terms and acronyms. This is especially true when you layer in security. It can be challenging to communicate the need to lock down specific websites, restrict email actions that involve patient information and enforce the need for multifactor authentication.

An organization's culture is an expression of its personality: it is the basis of its meaning, direction, and mobilization. IT must design and implement tools that uphold the organization’s culture. For this to be efficacious, IT management and leaders must comprehend how an organization's culture functions. When economic, technological, political, or social environmental factors fluctuate or are not recognized, they can become liabilities to the organization.

I’ve found the key to better communication is active listening. As an IT leader, you're required to listen and understand what adds value to clinical and executive leaders. It is IT's responsibility to become immersed in the business operations and know the initiatives of your peers. Before meetings, I remind myself of the '7-38-55 rule.' UCLA psychology professor Albert Mehrabian notes that only 7 percent of a message is based on the words, while 38 percent comes from the tone of voice and 55 percent from the speaker's body language and face. To me, this means you need more face time with your organization's key business leaders and stop managing by email. Talking, emailing, or video conferencing doesn't necessarily equal 'communicating with,' it can sometimes equal 'communicating at.' Some technologies, such as smartphones can create unnecessary distractions. There is no substitute for personal interactions to help in comprehension and building business coalitions.

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