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Becker’s Healthcare Podcast
Michael Ugwueke, President and CEO of Methodist Le Bonheur Healthcare
00:16:50
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- [00:00]
A
Welcome to Becker's Healthcare Podcast. I'm Chris Sosa, your host. I'm so thrilled to be joined today by Michael Ubu Eke. He of course, is the president and CEO of Methodist Levana Healthcare down in Memphis, Tennessee. Michael, thank you for joining us today.
- [00:14]
B
Thank you, Chris. I hope you're doing well.
- [00:17]
A
I am. Thank you so much for asking. We have you on today to talk about your journey as a healthcare professional. I know yours is an interesting one and I'm not going to get into that myself because I want you to tell. Tell your story, but. Yeah. You ready to go?
- [00:32]
B
Yes, let's do it.
- [00:33]
A
Wonderful. Michael, the first question I have for you is what is something you've learned outside of health care that you've been able to apply to your career?
- [00:42]
B
Very good question. Obviously, these days health care is intertwined with a lot of industries and services, unlike the early days when at least when I first got into health care. When I think about that question and look back, I think what I will point out really was back in the 90s when we were not as sophisticated as we are today, you know, little or less obviously computerization, EMR and all of those things. I was exposed to a balance scorecard concept. And this was back in the 90s, I think it was. No, Kaplan and Norton at the time from Harvard had started that concept and it was greatly used in other businesses where the emphasis was not just on financials, but having a balanced approach to your performance. So that caught my attention early back in the 90s. So that has been something that I've obviously used throughout my career, everywhere that I've been. To think of what are those driving metrics that really portrays the performance of the total performance of the organization and not just limited to financial metrics that everyone tend to gravitate to. So that includes quality, patient experience, associate engagement and other important metrics. That was one thing I can say that wasn't even available to health care being used in health care at the time that I would say some something that you know, from other industries that I brought into my experience.
- [02:32]
A
What do you think sort of opened the door for that sort of approach to be available and part of health care.
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B
So as time went on, health care obviously started getting more sophisticated and started looking at truly how do we present to the board and all this. And the board members were, you know, they were asking the same question because most of them obviously were coming from other industries and accustomed to understanding the importance of having a balanced approach at the same time having multiple indicators that Shows performance. And that's how I think that started being, becoming you know, prevalent in healthcare. In fact, I recall back late 90s, maybe 2000, most healthcare organizations started adopting the five pillars of four, five pillars. And those were all balanced pillars. And it varies from, you know, growth people, quality, finance and patient experience and test of direction. Got it.
- [03:44]
A
Michael, I want to shift gears a little bit here and talk a little bit more about yourself. Specifically what do you do to keep yourself healthy? Whether it's emotionally, physically, mentally. You know, being a present CEO of a health system is not an easy job. We all understand that. So it's important to keep yourself in the right frame of mind and you know, and, and strong in so many ways. So. So how do you keep yourself healthy?
- [04:10]
B
Yes. So I'm a firm believer in obviously we are in healthcare, obviously. So I'm a firm believer that being in this line of business, you have a responsibility and obligation both for yourself and for your associates to stay healthy. And that, you know, to me, I have always been an avid outdoor individual. I like to work out a lot. In fact, I do six days a week, usually up at 4:30 in the morning and go to the gym because that's the period that I have to myself, to be honest. So I use that time to, you know, work out, think about my day activities and kind of gives me a bit of a fresh start every day when I go through that, you know, whatever stress, you know, still there's dissipated during that time. So I work out six days a week. I'm also very strict with dietary stuff. Pretty much more Mediterranean diets. Occasionally I would incorporate pescatarian, such as fish, but I'm definitely haven't had meat or any meat related products, probably over 20, maybe close to 25 years. So I do that and I do it religiously as well. And then in addition to that, you know, I try to spend time, you know, with friends and family and carve out some time to reflect. I read a lot, try to read. I do mostly audible. So while I'm working out or driving or whatever, I try to incorporate interesting books. Most of them are not necessarily business books, but it gives me an opportunity to not just continue to learn, but to take my mind off from all the other elements there. So also in Memphis we kicked off what we call Healthier901 initiative. In fact, this weekend we're going to have a festival, the third annual festival. We always have it during the labor holiday weekend. So it'd be a Saturday, 30th August it'll be at a park we expect in probably close to 10,000 plus people there. So we, when we kick this off, because of my interest in Carcass of Wellness, the goal was to get the community to lose £1 million in three years. So our own associates and the community, we developed an app that we call Healthier901App and People is free and people download it and then put their metrics there, monitor their steps and exercise and everything that they do. So, you know, that's one of our initiatives in the community to make sure. So when you have such an initiative, you have to live by example. So, you know, that's how, how I try to maintain my sanity and my physical and emotional well being.
- [07:26]
A
Well, I imagine those are all paying off swimmingly. I am curious what you said. Not a lot of the books are business related. What sort of genre do you gravitate toward in terms of your books?
- [07:37]
B
So I read some history, I read some scientific stuff. You know, there's a lot on AI these days and all of that. So because, you know, I used to read all business books but I just started breaking it up, try to incorporate other things there.
- [07:58]
A
Gotcha. Well, certainly when you're here at our conference or whether you're at your festival, you know, coming up, hopefully you're sharing your reading list as well. Michael related to that, we all have tough days. It's just part of being alive, unfortunately. So I'm curious, when you have those types of days, what do you do to turn things around for yourself? Is it, is it a certain friend group, a family member or a certain element of your life that you're looking to say, okay, I know things are not great, so here's what I need to do to move forward? What does that mean?
- [08:36]
B
That's, that's a very good question, Chris. Obviously we do have tough days. I tend to reflect, you know, I journal sometimes. So I write down what I thought happened and reflect on it, you know, why am I having those feelings? And then I'll kind of try. I tried to reflect on it and you know, I've learned over time, quite frankly that, you know, you can only control what you can control. You know, things that are outside my control, control. I try not to spend a whole lot of time worrying about it because it's not going to change a whole lot. But those things that are within my control where those areas where I spend more time looking for how, you know, how I could have done them better. And as I reflect on those things and so I use that approach again, obviously I have a lot of friends and colleagues and mentors and to some degrees I reach out to them and just talk things out. Oftentimes when you're talking about, you tend to find the solution yourself because you know, you're now relating the story to someone. As you're doing that obviously the obvious things become more obvious. So. But again, I'm not the kind that spend a whole lot of time worrying about things that I really can't control.
- [10:09]
A
Do you find that that's approach. Well, let me put it this way. Do you try to share that approach with those in your organization and do you think it's, it's something they can learn from or have they learned from it already?
- [10:21]
B
Yes, some have learned from my style and I try to share that as well. You know, I mentor a lot of executives up in commerce as well. So you know, you beat up yourself sometimes and it's not necessary. Everyone makes mistakes, everyone learns. So the question is what you do without learning and obviously avoid making the same mistakes twice. So that's the approach that I use is more of, you know, no one is perfect.
- [10:52]
A
No, you're, you're absolutely right. I mean, for myself, there have been one or two times throughout my career. It's been long enough now that I can see that. All right. I wish I would have learned not to beat myself up sooner and concentrate more on the things that I could control. But it's not always an easy lesson to learn.
- [11:10]
B
It's not easy, but you develop the discipline over time. You know, it's like anything else. Muscle memory they call it. Right. The more you do that, the more you use it, the more you become aware of it and obviously try to incorporate it as part of your daily live in activities, all of that.
- [11:30]
A
It makes a lot of sense, Michael. And I love what you said about writing things down. Not everyone is going to use that approach certainly, but it's certainly you've developed a great self awareness about how to get yourself back on track. I'm certainly you've learned a lot about yourself. And with that is my next question is what is something you've learned about yourself from working in healthcare?
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B
I would say that healthcare, again at least from the hospital perspective, is a relationship business. So it's important to develop relationships whether it's with the physician colleagues or with associates. So that's one thing obviously that most of the industries may or may not be in tune too. So I, that's one thing that I, I learned specifically from working in healthcare. Even colleagues when you think about it, what they call it, you know, six degrees of separation now.
- [12:35]
A
They do, yeah.
- [12:36]
B
It's. Yeah. So you more than likely want to run into the same people that you work with in one place or another place. Again, I don't know if it's unique to healthcare, but I tend to run into the same executives that I worked for, have worked for me and that kind of stuff. So you have to value all of those things and know that you can really burn bridges, so to speak. So it's important in this industry that probably not industry, but I've only worked in this industry so.
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A
I could only.
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B
Speak to that experience, certainly.
- [13:15]
A
Michael, on a related note, so when you run into your colleagues, which, which happens at conferences, happens in day to day life, etc, how do you relate to each other in terms of the successes you've had and how you've all grown, not only as, as healthcare leaders, but as people? Like, what are those conversations like?
- [13:34]
B
It's actually very good conversations. Obviously, you know, you start talking about families or you knew them before. Some, some of them thought they got married. Now they've got married, they've got kids. So it is very rich and rewarding conversation and gives you time to really, you know, this road can be lonely at times as you know. So when you run into those colleagues and they know you, so they're not there trying to please you or tell you something you want to hear, they are there to really be a friend, a colleague and have some good times and written up conversations. So that's always exciting.
- [14:15]
A
Well, thank goodness you have that. I know I have that. I'm very lucky and I hope that extends to everyone in our audience too. Michael, my last question for you is, what is one risk you have taken that has paid off? Now, I know I just said one. It can be more than one and it can be related to something that happens in your health system. It could be personal. I'd love for you to answer that question in any way you see fit.
- [14:39]
B
All right. Again, I think just thinking back to that question, and I'm sure you probably know this when you said you looked at the TED Talk, you know, one big risk that I took that it's really paid off was living Nigeria back in the 80s at 21 years, coming to the United States, not really knowing it and not knowing how it's all going to end. So put myself through undergrad, graduate school, postgrad and all of that stuff. But it has really paid off, you know, so to me that was a big risk, a gamble, because, quite frankly, I didn't have the money to do all of that, but here I am, you know, so that, too, would be one risk that I took. And others is, quite frankly, throughout my career, I've had the privilege and opportunity to work in different markets and different organizations. As I got promoted or grew, a lot of them were, you know, taken, you know, out of fate, because, quite frankly, you're moving your family out of wherever their comfort zone was at the time to a different city, different states. And again, you have no idea how it's all going to end. So you're willing to obviously take calculated risk, but it's all paid off. So those would be some of the examples that I would give.
- [16:08]
A
Yeah. As our CEO loves to tell us, and she's right, the thing about getting out of your comfort zone is that that's when you do the most growth. So, I know not breaking news here, but it's certainly something that I know you can relate to. Michael, it's been so wonderful having you on. On. I will tell our audience that there's so much more to Michael's story here than we have time to get to. So please, if you run into him, whether it's a conference, you know, in a zoom chat, whatever it may be, please chat up Michael. And again, Michael, thank you for coming. I know it's your. Your time is limited, so it's been a pleasure having you on, and I can't wait until the next time we meet.
- [16:45]
B
All right, thank you, Chris. Appreciate the opportunity you take.