Health & Medical
Group effort
How to foster a great workplace
By Abby Cymerman
Smart Business St. Louis | September 2008
Page 1 of 2
Gary Olson
President and CEO, St. Luke’s Hospital
Humility could be Gary Olson’s
middle name. As the president and CEO of St. Luke’s
Hospital, Olson is under no illusion that he could do it all himself.
Olson says that in his 30 years
of working for the Chesterfield
organization, he’s learned that it
takes a team effort to create a
strong institution where
employees enjoy coming into
work every day.
“I’ve been given the opportunity, and if I use the talents of
the people here, the skills that they bring to the table, that’s
what moves this organization
forward, not one individual
whatsoever,” he says.
Olson leads his 3,000 employees at St. Luke’s with an emphasis on collaboration, and in fiscal
2007, the organization reported
$363 million in total operating
revenue, an increase of 7 percent over the prior fiscal year.
“Being surrounded with outstanding individuals makes you
want to perform better with
them,” he says. “Not for them
but with them.”
Smart Business spoke with
Olson about steps you can take
to make your organization a
great place to work.
Define your ideal workplace. For
me, an ideal workplace would
be a place where you can enjoy
coming to work, actually have
some fun and accomplish the
specific goals that have been
assigned to you. This is a place
where you can be proud of
what you’re doing — your
efforts as well as the results —
and it would be an A effort.
An ideal workplace here is an
environment where people like
to work with you and be around
you, and you feel like you’re all
working toward the right things
for your patients. This work-place provides the resources
and tools that a person needs to
be able to do the things they’re
trained to do. It’s an atmosphere
where you can actually have
friendships beyond the work-place, if that’s your choosing.
You’ll pull together if something unexpectedly becomes a
challenge, and you’ll want to be
a part of solving it. Employees
will want to contribute to the
success of the organization. It’s
a place of teamwork as opposed
to individual successes.
Start with communication. Business leaders can begin by going
out into the different parts of
their organization, visiting with
staff and having significant
amounts of communication —
accepting and receiving feedback and explaining to individuals why decisions are made so
that there’s full understanding.
I want whoever brings me a
concern to be able to state it
clearly, and I ask that they also
state the potential solutions to
the concern, as opposed to just
handing it to me. Their decisions
impact others so, where possible,
input should be sought before
bringing the final recommendations to me. If they feel comfortable, I would let them make the decision and not have to bring a
recommendation to me.
A title can define somebody’s
authority, but more importantly,
a person’s performance over
time defines their authority.
They know what they can
decide on their own or with
their staff, and they know what
they should run by management
for input before proceeding.
When you allow employees to
make decisions on their own, it
demonstrates that you value
their thoughts, their opinions
and their potential resolutions
to concerns.
Maintain corporate culture. Provide an atmosphere that allows
your employees to use the skills
that they’ve learned and let
them apply those and feel good
about them. They have to see results for others, more so than
for themselves, and they have to
know that they were a part of
those positive results or outcomes.
In health care, it comes down
to doing things not only with
great care but with a caring attitude. Success can be defined as
feeling good about what you’ve
accomplished and knowing that
you’re not done — you need to
do more each and every day.
Leaders should provide an
environment that is constructive,
collaborative, communicative,
friendly, and all of those fall under
the umbrella of high quality.
