The healthcare C-suite is changing, as many hospitals and health systems shake up their leadership structures in an attempt to ensure lasting success and support organizational transformation. Top priorities facing today's healthcare leaders range from delivering patient-centered care to promoting workforce well-being, optimizing new technologies like artificial intelligence, intelligent automation and analytics, and more.

At a time when the health industry is facing some of the roughest currents in history, we have an opportunity to rethink how we collectively steer the ship. When it comes to staying healthy and navigating the nation's current fee-for-service healthcare system, our industry is collectively sending a clear message to our patients and communities: You're on your own. 

A November article in Fortune shed light on the demand for softer CEOs. The crux of the article, which focuses on companies across various industries, is that in a post-pandemic world, recruiters are focusing less on administrative, financial and technical hard skills in CEO searches and more on empathy, humility and self-awareness. This raises the question: What does a "softer" CEO look like in healthcare? 

Charles Holland, CEO of St. Bernard Hospital in Chicago, is the recipient of this year's Steven Schroeder Award for Outstanding Healthcare CEO — an award created by The Leapfrog Group and Costs of Care to recognize hospital and health system leaders who have addressed quality and healthcare affordability for the communities they serve. 

At the Winter 2023 Transform Infusion Center Operations Virtual Summit, Ashley Joseph, an expert in using AI solutions to optimize infusion center operations, discussed the recent “impossible” accomplishments centers have made in adapting their resources to do more and the potential for transforming how infusion care is delivered in the future.

LeanTaaS experiences 170% revenue growth year to date over the last three years, including over 50% growth year over year for iQueue for Operating Rooms. Customer base grows to 185 health systems with 54% of its customers on Epic Systems’ EHR and 20% on Oracle Cerner’s EHR. 

Consumerism is reshaping healthcare. With greater access to information, patients are becoming increasingly active and empowered in their healthcare decisions, as well as selective in where and how they receive care. This shift is prompting health systems to use proactive, intentional and data-driven programs that foster patient engagement and loyalty.

Newark, Del.-based ChristianaCare has selected Marcin Jankowski, DO, as its new vice chair of surgery, according to a Dec. 4 news release.

Amazon, Walmart, Best Buy and others are challenging the traditional healthcare system by designing new ways to coordinate and deliver patient care. But disruption doesn't have to come from outside the industry.

New leaders who join a hospital or health system not only navigate a new role, but also a new organizational culture. In today's challenging healthcare climate, culture — and smoothly integrating new leaders into it  —  is becoming even more crucial in terms of talent management and ensuring a robust workforce to ensure high-quality care. Integrating new leadership is too important to leave to chance. 

Several health policy leaders will retire from Congress in the near future, taking with them decades of experience, according to Politico.

The opportunity for health systems and hospitals to leverage AI-powered technology to improve operational efficiency and financial sustainability is enormous.

When it comes to lean management, Bradley Haws, the new CEO of the University of Iowa Hospitals & Clinics and associate vice president of UI Health Care, offers a "key assumption": don't assume. 

Early in my career, I treated a young patient with uncontrollable asthma. Instead of being in school or playing sports with his friends and classmates, he was often in the hospital. My only goal was for this patient to get his asthma under control so he could live the life he and his parents imagined. Thankfully, a chance run-in fifteen years later confirmed that we were successful. All those years after the last time I saw the patient in the clinic, I saw him in the bleachers at a high school football game. He shared with me about his job and all that he’d gone on to accomplish in his life. 

The CEO role at hospitals and health systems continues to evolve as organizations navigate industry challenges. This evolution is often part of short-term and long-term strategy. 

Corinne Francis is the new executive vice president and chief mission integration officer of Livonia, Mich.-based Trinity Health. Becker's recently connected with her, drawing upon her 22 years of experience in healthcare mission integration work to illuminate the role's purpose and pain points in an ever-changing industry. 

The Ascension Parish Council voted to replace the board of Donaldsonville, La.-based Prevost Memorial Hospital on Nov. 21 after raising concerns about the board's activity over the last 10 years, according to The Advocate.

Emmett Shear led OpenAI for three days, between founder Sam Altman's exit from and return to the role. It was a 72-hour tenure for a CEO who is ambivalent about the role's future. 

From expanding healthcare access to innovation, health system CEOs have a lot on their minds as they think about the next year, as well as the next five or 10 years.  

For decades, hard skills have dominated the CEO search. In the post-pandemic world, recruiters are digging for something softer, Fortune reported Nov. 16.