Selecting a top management team was one of the first tasks John Fox accomplished when he was appointed CEO in March of eight-hospitalBeaumont Health, Southeast Michigan’s newest integrated delivery system.
By the fall of 2015, Fox was able to cross that priority off his list of things to do — by appointing 11 top executives — as part of what is expected to be a two-year process to complete the consolidation that joined Beaumont Health System, Oakwood Healthcare and Botsford Health Care.
Mirroring national consolidation trends in the wake of the Affordable Care Act, the three-way merger of Beaumont, Oakwood and Botsford — once lovingly called BOB — was approved in September 2014.
Beaumont, which once flirted with Henry Ford Health System, now is Southeast Michigan’s largest hospital system by inpatient market share, accounting for about 32 percent of all admissions.
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It is the second-largest system by revenue at $4.3 billion, slightly behind $4.7 billion Henry Ford, soon to be about $5.2 billion after it adds Jackson-based Allegiance Health.
Beaumont Health consists of eight hospitals with 3,337 beds, 168 outpatient sites, 5,603 physicians, 35,000 employees and about 3,500 volunteers.
About one-third of Beaumont’s top 12 executives came from outside of the system, including Fox, who previously was CEO of Emory Healthcare in Atlanta.
“The pleasant surprise is that it is going very well. The organizations are very much complementary to each other, and we are seeing the value of the synergy” they have created, Fox said.
Fox said a combined Beaumont will be much stronger for the future as the health care industry continues to face “significant financial pressure that will drive more consolidation.”
New top executives include COO Carolyn Wilson, RN, from Fairview Health System in Minneapolis; Chief Compliance Officer Dawn Geisert, an attorney from Henry Ford Health; and Chief Nursing Officer Susan Grant from Emory Healthcare in Atlanta.
Fox is still searching for a chief marketing officer. Longtime Beaumont CMO Mike Killian retired.
Other top executives in place include former Botsford CEO Paul LaCasse, D.O., who now is executive vice president of post-acute and diversified business integration, a new position.
Two top executives came from Oakwood: John Keuten, chief financial officer, and Mary Zatina, senior vice president of government relations and community affairs.
Five top executives came from Beaumont, including David Wood, M.D., chief medical officer; Gordon Walker, chief legal officer; Subra Sripada, chief transformation officer and system chief information officer; J. Paul Conway, chief human resources officer; Margaret Cooney Casey, chief development officer.
“We only had 11 leaders, vice president or above, leave (of 91 executive vice presidents or higher). That is not very many for an organization of 35,000 people,” said Fox, noting that five executives retired. “Our retention rate for our next level is 88 percent. We have stability, which is very important.”
Other merger accomplishments include the following: common systemwide electronic medical record, creation of single employed medical group and progress made on streamlining clinical care services.
Date: January 17, 2016