Dr. O’Brien started out his career as a family practice physician in Humboldt county (Eureka is also located within Humboldt). Fifteen years later, he obtained his Master’s degree in Administrative Medicine from the University of Wisconsin, Madison (in the year 2000) and began working as a hospital administrator. After moving along the West Coast starting as an Informatics Administrator then moving on to be a Chief Medical Officer, and Chief Operating Officer; he finally made it back to Eureka, where he is currently the president and CEO of St. Joseph Hospital (part of the St. Joseph Health System).

Dr. O’Brien finds that self-knowledge and the ability to relate to others is what makes great leaders. He suggested the Meyer’s Brigg Temperament test as a helpful tool to assess my own temperament in order to adapt and effectively interact with others. This involves making modifications to your personal communication style to accommodate others because affiliation is necessary to achieve positive change.

He felt that the most challenging part of healthcare leadership was developing other leaders in the organization. When you are successful, your job is made easier and that was the most rewarding part of the position. He believed that he had built a solid executive team looking for self-knowledge, emotional intelligence, leadership acumen, living organizational values, and the courage to address others as important qualities. The need is for committed people and good communication within the team. He and his staff work on making effective change processes by communicating with employees through rounding, employee forums, and monthly memos. He went on to describe how organizational change must start with building a structure. A unifying issue like losing patients and not meeting community needs helped to galvanize workers.

As for operational strategies, he said that it comes down to finding a balance between the mission and finances (no margin, no mission or no mission, no margin). The current culture at St. Joseph Hospital is of rebuilding. There had been difficult times in the recent past (union negotiations, layoffs, almost sold) along with difficulty recruiting skilled staff that had made the healthcare environment difficult in which to survive. Currently, the oppressive regulatory environment, unions, and a shortage of doctors and nurses are also obstacles to success.

He has witnessed organizational excellence at Autoliv which was a factory in Utah that made airbags. They had LEAN processes built on flow to reduce waste contributing to customer satisfaction. He also suggested the book by Jim Collins called Good to Great conscious choice and discipline for my further study on leadership.

Many of the concepts that Dr. O’Brien spoke of were familiar. He had a lot of experience in healthcare prior to his work in administration that gave him perspective on the issues currently facing hospitals and health systems. He gave examples of the types of interactions that he has with personnel that report to him. Overall, the interview went well and lasted for 45 minutes. It was an enjoyable interview with interesting insights into the organization of which I am employed. 

Mod1-Unit2_Interview_CEO-David OBrien.pdf