MHA's Executive Briefing

Wanted: More Directors With Digital Savvy

Nearly every facet of corporate life has gone digital. But many public-company boards remain stuck in analog mode. That has started to change. Boards worried about their scant digital expertise are scrambling to recruit newcomers who can advise management on strategies for mobile devices, social media and data analytics.

Read more from the Wall Street Journal here.

Building a Better Healthcare Board

Whether boards are too large, too unwieldy, or have members who are underqualified to effectively provide strategic direction, many of them need help to deal with the new realities of health care. Read more here.

Great Boards newsletter examines new models of governance

The spring edition of American Hospital Association's Great Boards newsletter looks at three emerging models of governance – the professional, clinical enterprise and enhanced community board models – and poses questions boards can use to evaluate their readiness for governing accountable, integrated care systems. The newsletter, available at www.greatboards.org, also looks at how board portals are improving governance effectiveness.

Administered by AHA's Center for Healthcare Governance, the free quarterly newsletter examines hospital and health system governance trends and effective practices. To subscribe, click here. For additional tools and resources for hospital boards of trustees, visit AHA's Great Boards website.

Webinars highlight strategies to eliminate disparities, promote diversity

Two new webinars from the American Hospital Association's Center for Healthcare Governance review strategies to eliminate health care disparities and promote leadership diversity at hospitals and health systems. Available free to all AHA members at www.americangovernance.com/policy, the webinars include key strategic planning questions for trustees to consider, board action checklists, and sources for additional information on health care disparities and diversity at the leadership and board level.

The webinar is part of the Center's Health Care in Transition education series, which brings the AHA's policy expertise and center's educational expertise to bear on critical policy and regulatory issues for trustees.

Trustees Need to be Proactive Agents of Change

Live from Phoenix: Boards of trustees are being asked to become more proactive in helping hospitals maneuver through health care's rapidly changing environment. In this video interview, Grinnell Regional Medical Center CEO Todd Linden discusses the role trustees can play in delivery system transformation.

Call for nominations: MHA's 2013 Distinguished Trustee of the Year

This prestigious award is given to an individual who has demonstrated significant contributions in the field of hospital governance over a sustained period of time. The nominee must be an active member of a hospital board or hospital corporate board that holds current membership in the Mississippi Hospital Association.

A selection committee appointed by the Chairman of the MHA Board of Governors will determine the recipient. Hospital Board Chairmen, other trustees, or hospital chief executive officers may make nominations.   

This award is given each year at the MHA Annual Leadership Conference.   The Trustee of the Year will be featured in a video presentation which will be shown during the awards presentation.  The 2012 Award recipient was Dr. Harry C. Frye from Beacham Memorial Hospital in Magnolia, Mississippi.  

The deadline for nomination is March 15, 2013.  The award criteria and nomination information are available here to assist in your selection process.  

For more information, contact Judith Forshee at (800) 289-8884, (601) 368-3216 or jforshee@mhanet.org. 

 

Report highlights governance practices for health care transformation

A new report from the American Hospital Association's Center for Healthcare Governance offers recommendations to help hospital and health system boards adopt new practices and help lead health care transformation in their organizations. Based on interviews with board members, executives and clinical leaders at four health care organizations and insights from an expert panel, the report recommends that boards identify and fill gaps in competency needed for transformation; consider emerging governance models; determine if board compensation is necessary or desirable; and ensure that trustee characteristics reflect the communities their organizations serve. It also calls for boards to adopt a high-performance culture and best practices, and evaluate performance at all levels of governance.

Among other actions, the report encourages continuous improvement of quality, safety and financial performance; candid discussions about what transformation means for the organization; strategies to engage patients, families and physicians; and a focus on community health needs.

Trustee of the Year nominations sought

Nominations are being accepted for Modern Healthcare's 2013 Trustee of the Year program. The 2013 awards, co-sponsored by executive search firm Witt/Kieffer, will honor four outstanding trustees or directors for their contributions to health care governance. Nominate a trustee here.

Monograph helps hospital boards engage physicians

The latest monograph from the American Hospital Association's Center for Healthcare Governance looks at the evolution of hospital/physician relationships from alignment to engagement and integration as a critical path for the improved performance necessary to achieve greater value. Authors William Jessee, M.D., and David Rowlee from Integrated Healthcare Strategies focus on the important role of culture as a driver of greater engagement, and suggest that the board’s role will encompass ensuring that robust systems are in place to measure, analyze and improve performance, including the areas of culture and engagement.

The monograph includes examples of instruments that measure culture in health care organizations and medical groups, and presents nine steps that organizations and their governing boards can take to improve performance.

Q&A: Physicians on Hospital Boards: Prepare to Challenge Traditional Wisdom

The fall 2012 issue of Great Boards is now available at www.greatboards.org (and attached below) and features a Q&A with John R. Combes, MD, President and Chief Operating Officer of the AHA’s Center for Healthcare Governance, and Barry S. Bader, governance consultant and contributing editor to the newsletter, sharing their views on the implications of health care transformation for physicians on boards.

Combes and Bader discuss the traditional roles physicians have played on boards and why board service for physicians has become more of a challenge. They discuss how value-based health care will enhance the role of physician trustees as they apply their clinical expertise to determine what adds value to health care and what does not. They also discuss competencies boards should look for in physicians serving on boards and where hospitals and physicians are most likely to find common ground in governance. Other topics include:

• Whether physicians on the active medical staff have conflicts of interest as trustees.
• If employed physicians should serve on boards.
• Common mistakes hospitals and medical staffs make as they change the roles and make-up of physicians on hospital boards.
• Emerging best practices related to physician board membership.
• How boards can best engage physicians to maximize their contribution to board service.

The article also includes a “do” and “don’t” list on physician trustee relationships with independent and employed physicians. Actions physician board members should take include communicating with the medical staff about the rationale for board decisions and how those decisions will advance the mission and encouraging the medical staff to choose leaders based on objective competencies and a collaborative work ethic, whether they are employed or independent. Combes and Bader caution physician board members to avoid undermining the board’s decision-making process or being apologists for the board with other physicians.

Download Greatboards-newsletter-fall-2012

(MHA trustees: To stay updated on information on governance issues, visit your MHA Trustee Community on MHA Connect. If you need your username and password, email Shawn Rossi at srossi@mhanet.org.)