Healthcare Executives Get Failing Grade from Simon Sinek

[tnbutterfly - Mary, BSN]

Simon Sinek, speaker and author of Start With Why: How Great Leaders Inspire Everyone to Take Action, gave failing grades to the country's political leaders and healthcare leaders at the Medical Group Management Association (MGMA) annual conference in Boston on Sunday, September 30, 2018.

They have a lot in common: They are doing a lousy job

It is the job of leaders, including those in healthcare, to take care of the people who work in their organizations.

The job of healthcare executives isn't taking care of patients, he said. That is the job of doctors, nurses and other frontline staff. The job of healthcare leaders is taking care of the people who work in their organizations, he said.

How would you rate the healthcare executives where you work?

What could they do to improve?

To read more go to MGMA 18: When it comes to leadership, Simon Sinek gives failing grades to politicians and healthcare executives

[Flatline, BSN, RN]

I utterly despise people like Sinek who say, "You suck! Do a better job!" but fail to provide direction.

Often, business leaders ask him how they can get the most out of their people, like they are wringing out a towel, he said. Instead, "the correct question is, 'How do I create an environment where people work to their best selves?'"

What does that mean? How does one create an environment where people work to their best selves?

What a lot of people fail to understand is that, for good or bad, healthcare is a business and executives run that business. They are in it to make that business as profitable as possible. If making people "work to their best selves," whatever that means, made tons of money then every other hospital executive would be riding the "best selves" train.

I have been all over the world visiting hospitals and have seen all kinds of environments from uber plush palace hospitals that cater to the middle-eastern elite to poor hospitals in the ghetto that struggle to keep the doors open. The one thing I can say for certain is that generally, the better the hospital endowment the more staffing and happier the employees are. Really comes down to the financial security of an institution. Hard to be happy when you are broke.

I love the spirit though, do better. Just wish someone would say how to do better.