How did you begin your career in health care?
I started off as a nursing student at Villanova University, bur inorganic chemistry and I did not get along, so I changed my major to Sociology. My next opportunity in the healthcare market was as a Strategic Alliance Manager at Lawson Software. Lawson was one of the first Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) companies to begin tailoring its Open Enterprise applications for specific vertical markets, the first of which was healthcare. Lawson worked with healthcare companies and healthcare professionals (i.e. Ernst and Young, Deloitte, Arthur Anderson, etc.) to develop customized financial, HR, and materials management application software specifically for the healthcare industry, including integrated delivery networks, hospitals, long-term care facilities, and health maintenance organizations (HMOs). And I have been in healthcare, except for a brief time as the Deputy CIO at USDA, ever since.

You recently joined the Advisory Board of AEGIS – congratulations! How did you prepare for the joining process?
I took part in the WBL Board Program last year, which helped me prepare for not only having a board specific bio, but also being bold enough to ask organizations if they are looking for board members. However, for my last four board appointments, Villanova (Dean’s Advisory Council), NuAxis (Advisory Board), NativeAg (Advisory Board) and now AEGIS, I was asked.

​​​You work to help company leaders become “Strategic Doers” who can strike a successful balance between planning and executing their ideas. Is there a common mistake executives make that holds them back from becoming Strategic Doers?
Not building a coalition of partners from all the stakeholder groups (IT, HR, Finance, operations, etc.) when making changes, and improvements. At USDA, I called it “The Coalition of the Willing” – willing to get things done. With any organization, execution is the “bogeyman/woman” and forging ahead without collaboration, communication, and coordination is a recipe for failure.

As a strategic planning expert, what advice do you have for companies who may need to shift business models as they navigate the COVID-19 pandemic?
The full impact of the COVID-19 pandemic is still unfolding, but it’s already clear that the outbreak will spark major changes in the technology industry, which has already been called on in a big way to preserve social community and workplace collaboration as billions of people are forced to stay home under some variety of lockdown. Many people now trying to work from home (with their children home, too) are experiencing bogged-down speeds. The answer will be a faster plan and new wireless equipment from internet providers. Becoming a digitally-savvy person and organization is the only way to survive and thrive, especially when it comes to the delivery of education (on-line, distance learning) and healthcare (telehealth). In order for the organization to benefit from technology, we first need to improve (and in some cases establish) processes. Yes, I am talking about policies and governance. Without them we are building a house of cards.

You have extensive experience in the IT space. What is one major challenge and/or opportunity in IT that health care executives need to plan for this year?
Only one? (ha!) If I had to narrow it down: improving the overall IT product/technology processes, and employee recruiting, reskilling, and retaining. Let’s take the first one – improving the overall IT/technology processes. The federal government is required to start developing a framework for implementation of Technology Business Management (TBM). TBM can help by identifying IT waste and inefficiencies, such as quantifying the cost of excess capacity in storage or computer infrastructures, or identifying labor spent on low-priority applications. Furthermore, by improving the accountability for infrastructure spending, TBM can help reduce demand and further optimize costs without a perceived decrease in service quality.   

Healthcare providers are also increasingly investing in a broader portfolio of innovation. These include priorities such as electronic medical records (EMR), data analytics (population health, clinical, operational), telehealth technology, and more. TBM helps by reporting on such spending and providing an easier means for connecting IT resources (e.g., infrastructure, people, external services) to healthcare services. As a result, healthcare leaders can use TBM to evaluate IT as a portfolio of investments and direct both CapEx and OpEx to where it will do the most good. In healthcare, a cyberattack can do more than just impair trust or result in fines or other penalties, it can impact patient health. As the “attack surface” expands with more health data, active medical devices, power and environmental controls and other systems, the need for strong asset management practices increases. Fortunately, TBM emphasizes asset management hygiene by often highlighting poor asset data used in the TBM model.

By improving both accountability for asset data and the costs of acquiring and maintaining them, TBM often drives a virtuous cycle of asset data quality. In turn, this helps security teams and asset owners better understand their assets and vulnerabilities and prioritize remediation. Furthermore, TBM can clarify existing spending on security, sometimes revealing inadequate coverage.  Healthcare CIOs often cite public cloud adoption as a high priority. Sometimes, this is driven by the desire for improved speed to market, potentially lower costs, improved security, and freeing up mindshare to focus on more important priorities than infrastructure and platforms. TBM helps govern the usage of public cloud by driving accountability for spending and consumption. It can also be used to highlight areas for improvement, such as development environments and poorly utilized applications.

Personally or professionally, what might the WBL network be surprised to know about you?
Personally, I have 4 grandchildren that I adore, ages 15 to 12 (but he will be 13 in June).  I ran track in high school and college – 100, 200 and hurdles and was a concert pianist through college. Professionally, I created a data science camp for underserved/underrepresented youth in 2014 which is now going into its 6th year. The camp is called Science Technology Engineering Agriculture and Math (STEAM) as the flagship, with two others under development – Science Technology Engineering Energy and Math (STEEM) and Science Technology Engineering Athletics and Math (STEAM). I also have certificates in Design Thinking, Scaled Agile, Technology Business Management and Sports Management. In addition to being a Strategic-Doer, I am also an advocate of “Never Stop Learning.”