Modern Healthcare has named its 31st annual "Up & Comers" list, recognizing young health care leaders who are making a big difference in the industry.
How to truly engage your up-and-coming leaders
Methodology
To be eligible for the list, nominees had to be 40 years old or younger. Magazine readers nominated promising young health care leaders serving at various levels of provider, insurance, supplier, and vendor organizations. Modern Healthcare then selected its 15 "Up & Comers" based on:
- The scope of their leadership roles and accomplishments;
- The financial and operating performance of the organization(s) under the nominee's leadership;
- Their leadership outside of their organization; and
- Their community service work.
2017's 'Up & Comers'
Honorees from provider and payer organizations include:
Daniel Barr, VP of operations at Nationwide Children's Hospital (Columbus, Ohio). Barr manages the system's hematology, oncology, and bone marrow transplant service line. He oversees more than $200 million in revenue, about 230 full-time employees, as well as more than 30 physicians and a research team. The service line has seen a 55 percent increase in net margin during his tenure.
Genevieve Caruncho-Simpson, COO of Texas Health Aetna (Arlington, Texas). Caruncho-Simpson has "focused her career on helping marginalized populations," Valerie Lapointe writes for Modern Healthcare. Before coming to Texas Health Aetna in April, Caruncho-Simpson worked at Ascension Health and Miami Children's Hospital, where she helped develop a maternal-fetal medicine strategy that led to a partnership with Brigham and Women's Hospital
Brian Davidson, CEO of St. Mary's Medical Center (Grand Junction, Colorado). Under Davidson's leadership, St. Mary's Medical Center "is exceeding budgeted operating margin performance by more than 10 percent" despite net patient revenue growing at under 2 percent—and a struggling market, Lapointe reports. Davidson is one of just three physician CEOs in the state.
Vanessa Guzman, VP of quality and improvement and network management at Montefiore Health (New York). Guzman started at Montefiore Information Technology in 2010 and has since transitioned to quality improvement. In her current role, she has streamlined and maximized revenue, created a program to consolidate regulatory and quality requirements, initiated a patient engagement program, and helped the system succeed in the Next Generation ACO program.
Chantel Johnson, pediatric service line director and director of operations at Palo Alto Medical Foundation (Palo Alto, California). Johnson, an RN, oversees the Foundation's 21 pediatric clinics in the San Francisco Bay Area. Under Johnson's leadership, employee satisfaction is in the 95th percentile and quality has been benchmarked at the 90th percentile.
Angela Lalas, SVP for finance at Loma Linda University Health (Loma Linda, California). Lalas has overseen financial operations for Loma Linda University Health's four licensed hospitals. In addition, she has served as CFO for the organization's shared services corporation. The hospitals have seen financial performance improve for two years in a row, with their combined net operating income increasing from $14.4 million in 2014—at a .09 percent margin—to $104.7 million in 2016, at a 5.9 percent margin.
Jose Lozano, chief of staff of Hackensack Meridian Health (Meridian, New Jersey). In his role, Lozano oversaw communication and launch of the 2016 merger between Hackensack University Health Network and Meridian Health, which was one of the biggest mergers in the state, Lapointe reports. He also took the helm of design and construction for new corporate offices of the merged entity. The project was done below budget and on time, according to Lapointe.
Betsy McVay, VP and chief analytics officer of UnityPoint Health (Des Moines, Iowa). McVay takes pride in being able to leverage data to view things from a new perspective, Lapointe reports. McVay and her team have spotted $57 million in system-wide cost savings, and they have worked with the CFO on analytics support to reconfigure finances to move away from a fee-for-service model.
Farzana Rashid Hossain, assistant professor of clinical medicine and program director at Penn Medicine, (Philadelphia). Rashid Hossain leads women's gastrointestinal health at Penn Medicine, focusing on changing work methods, challenging policy, and advocating for innovative ideas. She is also a member of the Philadelphia Commission for Women, which works with community organizations and social service agencies to address gender inequality. Philadelphia magazine recognized her in its annual Top Docs issue for 2017.
Michael Rosenbloom, clinical director of the center for memory and aging at HealthPartners (Bloomington, Minnesota). Rosenbloom has worked on a possible treatment for Alzheimer's that involves spraying a mist of intranasal insulin directly into the brain. He is also leading the trial for Imaging Dementia Evidence for Amyloid Scanning (IDEAS), which aims to provide a definitive diagnosis to Alzheimer's patients.
Mario Schlosser, CEO of Oscar Health (New York). Schlosser co-founded Oscar, a technology-based insurer, in 2012 after witnessing "how complicated the health care system was to navigate" during his wife's first pregnancy. Since then, Oscar has raised $720 million in six rounds of funding, with some estimates pegging the company's value at $2.7 billion. Schlosser is leading Oscar in forging a partnership with Cleveland Clinic to offer the clinic's first health insurance plan, Lapointe reports.
Baligh Yehia, deputy undersecretary for health at Veterans Affairs, VA (Washington, D.C.). Yehia rose to the deputy undersecretary position after coming to the VA as assistant director of community care in 2016. As deputy undersecretary, Yehia has managed an operating budget that exceeds $10 billion as well as more than 7,000 employees and five business lines.
Beyond payers and providers mentioned in the list, other honorees include:
- Kevin Kulmer, president of health systems at ZocDoc (New York);
- Omri Shor, CEO of Medisafe (Boston);
- Lisa Tseng, EVP at Optum (Eden Prairie, Minnesota) (Lapointe, "Up & Comers 2017," Modern Healthcare, accessed 10/16; Up & Comers 2017 methodology, accessed 10/16).
How to truly engage your up-and-coming leaders
Health care leader engagement is declining nationally—and much more quickly than frontline engagement. But if organizations are going to become truly great places to work, they need leaders who are energized and excited by their work.
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