"The most rewarding part of the day is when I am heading home, and I know things are working as designed. It's knowing that the people and staff are in a good place and I'm leaving the university and medical center in a better place than where we started."

"There aren't really typical days when you're a clinical leader in a 974-bed hospital. There's really no such thing as 'typical.'"

"The needs of patients don't really fit into an eight-hour day, and the responsibility we have as leaders doesn't either. Leadership is largely about communication, and it doesn't fit neatly into a workday, especially in a patient care environment." 

"The most rewarding part of my day is usually at 8:45 a.m., when I hear a report of all zeros on the five safety metrics we focus on." 

"When I became CEO, which was not in my career plan, I was chief of surgery. The executive suite was on the fifth floor, and I felt that that didn't necessarily fit with my style. So I moved my office down beside the cafeteria, right in the center of the hospital."

"The way the AHA works — you spend a year as chair elect, then you spend a year as the chair, and finally you spend a year as the past chair. The time obligation is pretty significant and it's not just the travel piece, it's participating in a lot of calls and making sure you're staying on top of the issues we're facing as an industry. In my year as chair elect, I'm on the road probably two to three times a month."

"I'm an early bird, so I try to get to bed on time because having enough sleep is important. That is something I've learned as an executive. As a leader you meet hundreds and hundreds of people a day, and every interaction you have with folks is being measured and perceived differently. These conversations may be just one conversation out of dozens and dozens in a day for me, but to the person I'm speaking with it may be the most important conversation they will have in an entire year."  

"When I do meet in person with my direct reports, I hold what are called performance management meetings where we cover a wide range of topics. We each come in with an agenda and after every meeting I personally type up a summary including to-do lists, what's next for them and timeframes. It's a way we stay connected and clear on what was said in the meeting and it cuts down miscommunications."