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Becker’s Healthcare Podcast
Building Workforce Engagement and High Reliability at Presbyterian Santa Fe Medical Center with Callie Miller
00:10:06
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- [00:00]
A
This is Laura Dardo with the Beckers Healthcare podcast. I'm thrilled today to be joined by Callie Miller, hospital Chief Executive at Presbyterian Santa Fe Medical Center. Callie, it's a pleasure to have you on the podcast today.
- [00:12]
B
Yes, thanks for having me, Laura. Happy to be here.
- [00:14]
A
Absolutely. Now, I'm looking forward to our conversation and just learning a little bit more about everything you're doing at Presbyterian Santa Fe Medical center, because I know it's such a fascinating time in healthcare and certainly a lot. A lot to be thinking about and
- [00:27]
B
sharing across the industry, and so I'm
- [00:29]
A
looking forward to that. But before we dig in, can you tell me a little bit more. More about yourself and the hospital?
- [00:35]
B
Yeah, sure. Absolutely. I'm Kelly Miller. I'm the hospital CEO at Presbyterian Santa Fe Medical center in Santa Fe, New Mexico. Presbyterian is a large integrated healthcare system in New Mexico. So we have both a traditional delivery system of hospitals, clinics, ambulance service, plus we have our own health plan. So we serve one in three New Mexicans through care delivery or health coverage in the state, which is really unique. Like I said, I'm at our Santa Fe Hospital, which is an acute care facility within our northern New Mexico operations. I've been here now. I'm going on three years in Santa Fe as a whole, going on almost two years in this particular role.
- [01:12]
A
That's fantastic. And, you know, I think, especially when you look at everything that's going on in healthcare, it's been an impactful two years that you've been at the helm. And so can you tell us a little bit more about some of the trends that you're watching currently?
- [01:27]
B
Yeah, yeah, I think you hit on it. It's an interesting time in healthcare. So certainly a lot of trends to be keeping up with. I would say one of the top trends I'm always watching is workforce engagement. You know, engagement amongst our healthcare teams is probably more critical than it has ever been, I think we all know. But, you know, an engaged team really drives quality improvement, of course, drives retention and decreased turnover. So within workforce engagement, too, I'm specifically watching manager development and capability, especially around our frontline managers. You know, we're seeing that this is usually their first management role, and so they're onboarding, and then their ongoing development and growth is really critical to our success as a facility. You know, when your frontline managers are successful, that really drives improvement and engagement for the whole facility. I think, you know, the next trend most people are watching, regardless of the industry they're in, is, of course, AI, you know, in healthcare we're really looking closely at how it's reducing the burden on our physicians and APCs. And it's really amazing that five, six years ago, the ambient learning was not as robust as it is now. So we're seeing wins with the ambient AI. Our medical group has rolled out to our physicians and APCs here. And, you know, I'm hearing directly from physicians that it's made a significant difference for them and their practice, and that's huge. I think third trend is, of course, the constantly changing financial landscape. You know, as a healthcare executive, you really have to stay up to date and informed in this area at all times. Watching a lot of the changes at the federal and state level and how that impacts facilities like Santa Fe Medical Center. It's important that we really can be financially sustainable without compromising on our mission or our impact in the community.
- [03:11]
A
I love that. I think all of those trends are so important and very much top of mind for many leaders across the country. And I think, especially when you look at workforce engagement in how valuable every person is on the team and in care delivery or administrative, and from your perspective, what are some of the things that you're doing really, to improve retention and just keep that workforce engaged, especially with some of the uncertainties going through the industry right now?
- [03:38]
B
I think, yeah, keeping the workforce engaged has been, you know, critical for us here. And it's probably one of the things I'm most proud of. You know, I'm really proud of the culture we're building here at Santa Fe Medical Center. So we're actually the newest hospital within Presbyterian. We opened in 2018, and then, of course, shortly after that, had a pandemic in 2020. So coming out of that pandemic and trying to stabilize, we've really spent the last few years laying the groundwork for the hospital we wanna be and the culture we wanna have. And so it takes time to build that culture. It really doesn't happen overnight. So I'm proud to say that we've been doing that. We've seen our engagement scores for all staff and then our physician and APC group increase based on the year, on the surveys we had in 2025, you know, which is great. And it takes a lot of effort to do that. So it's important to me that staff feel and know they can escalate ideas, concerns, or anything else. And we're really seeing that in our engagement score. So I'm proud of that.
- [04:39]
A
That's great to hear. It really impressive to have that type of engagement and really involvement by the staff and how the health of the organization is going. And to your other point, too, in looking at technology, AI and, you know, really leveraging that to its fullest abilities, I think things are moving so quickly with technology, and there are a lot of changes happening with AI in particular, when you think about all the different opportunities out there. But then, you know, it can also bring some additional risks or challenges. And so when you look at AI from your organizational standpoint, what are the conversations like with your leadership team and how are you really keeping things focused and resources focused in the areas that make the most sense sense through this digital transformation process?
- [05:25]
B
I think it's a great question. I mean, I think, you know, really where we've seen Presbyterian as a system really invests is, like I mentioned, in our position at APC groups and really trying to decrease the burden on them, the documentation burden, which we all know is there. And so, you know, to be able to keep and retain your physicians and APCs, taking some of that burden off of them has been critical. So, you know, again, proud to say that Presbyterian as a whole has really rolled that out to our physicians and APCs, and we're seeing that momentum there. I think next steps are, you know, organizational, wide. There's, you know, opportunities to look at, you know, other areas where we can have wins like that, things that we can automate, things that are administrative in nature, that we can take off people's plates so that we can really focus on quality and the patient experience. So excited to see where that kind of takes us in the future.
- [06:17]
A
I love it. I think that's so helpful to really understand where your head's at and to where some of the things that are the biggest opportunities for you moving forward. And, you know, speaking of that, what are you most focused on and excited about? And can you tell us a little bit as well about something you're proud of from the last six to 18 months or so?
- [06:35]
B
Yeah, it's a great question. You know, like I mentioned, really proud of the culture we're building here at Santa Fe Medical Center. You know, we've, like I said, built this culture slowly year over year. And so, you know, that's. That's our team coming together to really do that. And so, like I mentioned, we're seeing that in our engagement scores. So we saw an increase in our engagement scores for all staff and then physician APCs over 2024 performance. So we saw that in 2025. Of course, we will survey Everybody again here in the fall. And so again expecting to really continue to increase engagement. So something I'm really proud of there. What we're going to be focused on and excited about in 2026 is, you know, some of our key quality initiatives. We're really laying the groundwork as a system for our journey to high reliability, which is great. And then Santa Fe Medical center really saw some record growth for key services last year. And the plan is to continue to grow those services as well as grow the overall acuity of the facility. And that's going to allow us to expand the patients we're able to care for in Santa Fe. So I'm really excited about that.
- [07:39]
A
That's cool to hear. And I think it's so critical to have that clinical team in place that really is able to serve the community and adapt to whatever the community needs are at any time. And, you know, that journey to high reliability is not an easy one. I know it takes a lot of planning and time and then effort from the team in order to get there. So as you're going through this journey, has there been anything that has surprised you so far about it or where do you see some of the spaces where your team is just most excited to dig in?
- [08:09]
B
I don't think there's anything that's come out so far. We're really kind of at the beginning of this journey. And so I know really this entire week we have partners here with Press Ganey really helping us on our high reliability journey. So right now we're really in kind of a fact finding mode and kind of in that, you know, talking to frontline staff. So really excited about this week. They'll be at Santa Fe on Friday. And so that's really a chance for our frontline staff to, you know, talk about quality, talk about their processes, talk about things that maybe they see as an opportunity. So, you know, just grateful that the staff is really plugging into that work and that they're excited about it. So, yeah, excited about that journey this year, absolutely.
- [08:53]
A
That sounds great and definitely will be looking forward to learning more as you get further along within that journey. Now, before we wrap up here, I wanted to talk about leadership as well. What advice would you give to evolving leaders, especially those who are trying to just build their career in emerging in the space?
- [09:11]
B
I think two pieces of advice that I would give, I think first, you know, be open to opportunities. I think career opportunities such as promotions or the chance to, you know, be over a new service line or book a business sometimes come when you least expect it. And those can be the best opportunities to really grow and learn. So just embrace it. And then I think second piece of advice is really take the time to invest in physician relationships. You know, as a healthcare executive, you really cannot be successful without the trust and buy in from your physicians. So it's important to invest early on and really continuously build those relationships with them. So those are my two pieces of advice.
- [09:51]
A
I love it. Callie, thank you so much for joining us on the podcast today. This has been such an insightful conversation, inspiring to hear about what you've been up to and looking forward to continuing this conversation in the future.
- [10:02]
B
Absolutely. Thanks for having me. Laura.