Sean Poellnitz serves as Vice President of Supply Chain at Mosaic Life Care.
On October 13th, Sean will serve on the panel "Supply Chain and Medical Equipment - IT’s Benefits and Challenges" at Becker's Annual Health IT + Revenue Cycle Conference. As part of an ongoing series, Becker's is talking to healthcare leaders who plan to speak at the conference, which will take place October 13-16, 2020 at Navy Pier, Chicago.
To learn more about the conference and Sean's session, click here.
Question: How has the coronavirus pandemic forced a paradigm shift in your line of work, from your perspective?
Sean Poellnitz: Almost overnight we had to see what aspect of our workforce could work from home and understand our current readiness to support their success. We became very aware of how Supply Chain was not a defensive function but a critical offensive function that must have a seat at the big table as an essential business partner to the organization. In a blink of an eye, healthcare became global. From Bloomberg to Fox News we needed to become a global economist to position our organization for success.
Q: What is the most underrated trait of the best leaders?
SP: The courage to make decisive decisions and craft strategy while facing a tremendous amount of lack of clarity, the need for speed in the midst of facing substantial unknown variables that have real-world consequences.
Q: What is one bold goal that you, your team or your organization is staring down for 2021?
SP: For our Supply Chain organization we are going to continue to be the dynamic business partner that our organization needs while being able to prepare ourselves to operate in a wave of uncertainty while still having the product at the right place, time, and cost to support operations.
Q: What fundamentals would you encourage your peers to revisit and refine when it comes to health IT and revenue cycle management?
SP: I created a model called Pandemic Leadership Model with three key factors:
1.Respond above clarity
2. Create a new business model
3. Pivot your Leadership
All of these aspects equip the leader to take on the unexpected while being productive during times of immense challenges and change.