intro: This episode is part of a special Women In Leadership Podcast series.
Host: Hi everyone.
Thank you for tuning in for this episode of the Rapid Insights focusing on
Women in Leadership Interview series.
My name is Sarah Brownell.
I am the strategic growth Director for HDR Architecture, and it is my absolute
honor and privilege to bring these interviews to you through this forum.
Thank you so much to shushed for your support of these and for this platform.
These are really, truly just a joy to be able to do, and I'm so thankful.
I am so excited about today's interview in particular.
Oddly, the first one I've done in my hometown.
So this is very fulfilling, very exciting for me for a number of different reasons.
I know this organization and I've seen the impact on a personal level because
my friends and families come here.
So very excited about that aspect of this, but also just really excited to talk
to you and get to hear more about you.
So today we have Cali Dobbins.
She's the Senior Vice President of Children's at Atrium Health, and there's
been a lot of change happening here.
There has.
Your role continues to change.
but what I wanna do is maybe start off with just a look back and hear
from you a little bit about your background and kind of how you
got to this point in time today.
Guest 1: Sure.
So, well, thanks for having me.
I love that we get to do this podcast in your backyard.
and I really look forward to the conversation and been
excited about it all week.
So I am a registered nurse, so I always start there because it is a really
important element of who Callie is and who Callie wants to be, even in the
leadership roles that she has today.
I went to nursing school and fell head over heels with this
ability to care for people.
At the same time of using the way my brain worked, which was sort of thinking through
the lens of science, I ultimately left the University of Chapel Hill as a registered
nurse and started in the neonatal ICU.
And for anyone that's ever spent any moments or has friends who have spent any
moments in the nicu, you tend to hear.
Some thematics that emerge around disruption of normalcy.
You know, people have this vision of what taking home a newborn's supposed
to be and all of that's disrupted.
You also tend to have scenarios where the length of stay.
For that child is really long, and so as a nurse, what I ended up not knowing
then that I now can look back and realize is that it really became a microcosm
for the way I think about healthcare.
There is nobody that wants to be in the nicu, right?
It's a full disruption of life.
It becomes a family story and it tends to be disruptive enough because
it's a long period of time that your ability as a bedside nurse to
make an impact is pretty profound.
I never really, truly thought I was going to.
Do anything other than clinical care.
When I left Chapel Hill, they're very good on what is your five-year plan.
They're always thinking about what's to come, and I thought I would be
a nurse practitioner and I was at a crossroads about five years into my
clinical pathway in the unit that I was currently in, which happened to be at
Carolina's Healthcare System in the nicu.
So technically speaking, just right above our head.
Today, and the team was without a leader, and I had been doing some formal, but
not formal management roles, if you will, through education and training.
So it was a perfect story of a little bit of peer pressure, a little bit
of naivety, and a bit of boldness.
And people kept pushing Callie consider, and I was like, no, no, I'm good.
I have one little child at the time and I love taking care of my patients.
I clearly, over time that peer pressure became stronger and my
internal sort of motivator became stronger, and I ultimately took the
role of being the nurse manager.
And while that may not seem significant.
Why I say it was a little dose of naivety is that at the time, that was
the largest department in Carolina's healthcare system, and I was a brand
new leader, but I could see potential.
I partly was lucky that I knew the team from the clinical lens and from working
side by side with them for a number of years and could see this future that.
I don't know that at the time everyone else could see, but it was an ability
to really start moving teams forward.
And I knew that it was either going to be the best thing I ever did in
my career, or ultimately pushed me in the direction of which I thought
was going to be my direction.
And that was going back to school to be a nurse practitioner.
And I guess I'd say plot twist.
I fell in love with leadership.
I fell in love with taking care of teams who take care of patients.
And ever since that day, I have.
From run role to others, had the opportunity to start shaping healthcare
in the beginning at in one unit level, and then across a team of units.
About 10 years ago, 10, 12 years ago, I became the hospital president
for Levine Children's Hospital.
and Levine Children's Hospital, for those that don't know, is a children's hospital
that is now just about 16, 17 years old.
And so we were looking for our second leader.
And I was certainly given a significant opportunity to, once again, push
through a door that maybe one would say you're not quite ready for.
and find a way to shape healthcare on a macro scale at the time
for Charlotte, where the largest children's hospital in North Carolina
and I haven't looked back since.
Host: That's amazing.
So it sounds like it was a mix of being pushed and then kind of taking
opportunities as they arose, right?
Yeah.
across the years.
Thinking about taking on these new roles.
You mentioned before, you know, not sure if you were ready.
How much of it do you think, was it about the connections to your
peers that kind of propelled you?
Do you have any thoughts on that?
Guest 1: Yeah, you know, I think when you're a leader, whether that's
in a very formal sense or in an informal sense through influence.
You have to always recognize that people are watching, whether that's your peers,
whether that's individuals who may aspire to be in a role that you are in, or
whether that is your superiors looking inward at their portfolio of talent.
And so again, some of this is learned over time, but what I would say that has been a
common thread through a lot of my journey.
Is that I have always believed it's important that you show up to be the
person you might wanna be in the future, and that might be being a role that's
way bigger than where you are today.
But if you play big, if you're just confident enough, but humble enough
to listen, to learn, to pivot, to make recommendations, what I have found is
that even when you're maybe in a room.
That you're not quite ready for.
People almost universally pay attention and they may not know it immediately.
Right.
You may have just stimulated a little nugget to say, Hmm, I'm really
interested in what she said, or what potential might she have in the future?
And I think that's been something that I now hope my team would
say that I instill in them.
And I think it's been certainly part of the secret sauce,
if you will, of my career.
Host: And I mean, obviously you have such a amazing group of advocates
for you, among your team, and that says a lot about you as a leader.
Kudos on that.
Well,
Guest 1: thank you.
I, think, we're only as strong as the team we have around us.
Yeah.
And you know, that's a bit cliche and people say it often, but I think again, it
goes back to how do you show up every day?
Are you really invested in helping the next leader, whether that's your peer,
whether that's your superior, or whether that's somebody that's reporting to
you show up and be their best self.
And that tends to create a, I would use the word loyalty.
Not loyalty for the sense of ownership, but loyalty in the sense of loyalty
to the work we have ahead of us.
Host: So thinking about your teams then, and also your background.
I mean, you, you are an rn.
Yes.
Started out in the nicu.
Yeah.
And now you're leading a, huge, well-respected pediatric institution.
How does your background influence and impact the way you approach your role?
Today and maybe even moving forward.
Guest 1: So, and I said in the beginning, I will always start any
conversation with I am a nurse.
And again, it's mostly because it's really important to the DNA of who I am.
Mm-hmm.
And so when you spend time thinking about decisions.
Through the pathway of impact to the clinical teammates.
I don't think it is the only way you can make great healthcare decisions, but I
do think it's a unique combination of skill sets that not a lot of leaders have.
Particularly not a lot of senior leaders.
Healthcare is.
A team sport.
So at the bedside right now, people taking care of patients, you're gonna
see a variety of disciplines coming around a patient to make hopefully the
best decision possible for that in our case, child that's in front of them.
And so I really try to think about it through the lens of.
The team dynamics.
I don't pretend to be anything more than I am.
I also would say that it takes an incredible amount of intentionality
to being the best in anything.
So I am not the most competent nurse in the room anymore either,
but I will never not be a nurse.
And so how do we think about nurses in the role of healthcare?
They tend to be the person who brings teams together.
They tend to be.
A individual who has the role of advocacy at the bedside because they tend to
spend the most time with their patient.
And I think it was those skill sets back in the NICU that I learned, sort
of this microcosm of healthcare that slowly but surely helped me develop
skills that I can use in the proverbial boardroom and really challenge ourselves
to say, well, how do we know that?
Are we sure we know that?
Are we thinking broad and deeply enough through the lens
of our patient center team?
Host: Yeah, no, I think that's phenomenal.
And I think also that aspect of building trust Yes, too, that and,
empathy that you have to bring into your role as a nurse, but also you
clearly demonstrate as a leader today.
So I think that's amazing.
Understanding our listeners are, you know, we're the Society of Healthcare
Strategy and market development, and so I wanna talk a little bit about strategy.
Can you share some of your perspective on your, maybe your philosophy on how
you approach strategy in your role today?
Guest 1: Of course.
first of all, I think strategy's really important, and I have learned so
much from my sort of strategy purist, both, whether that is internal to the
organization that I'm a part of, or whether that's externally connected
across organizations and memberships that I have the opportunity to be part of.
But what I would say that I sometimes see in this sort of juxtaposition
between the work we need to do today and where we want to go in the future.
Is what can feel like as people talk about the future through the
lens of strategy as a little bit squishy and a little bit nebulous.
Mm-hmm.
Sometimes we'll say things like, oh, let's go find that strategy document even on
the, you know, the shelf, if you will.
And what I've really tried to create is the lens of thinking about strategy
through the background of operations.
I find that teams, when they're in the trenches often need
something to aspire to be next.
And so that to me is what our strategy is.
What are we trying to do tomorrow or in the future that today is going to
get set us up for that next success.
And I really.
Do believe that strategies should be inspiring.
Mm-hmm.
When we get people or teams around a room together to talk about what we wanna do
next, how could you not be inspired by it?
And so I think through what is it we wanna do?
what's the nation's best?
In our case, I'm talking about children's healthcare.
So what are some of the leading institutions across this country
that are doing whatever it is differently, better than us?
And where are we today?
And how do we get ourselves from there to where we aspire to be?
And then to me, the strategy is working backwards.
It is truly a roadmap from, all right, well if this is where we
are, let's be honest about where we are and this is where we wanna be.
Then what is it gonna take to get there?
And what are those milestones?
What are those check-in moments that we need to check ourselves against
the reality of are we actually becoming the thing, the whatever it
is in front of us that we wanna be?
As I mentioned, the children's hospital's not very old in the season of life or
children's hospitals nationally, and yet the children's hospital that I have
responsibility for in Charlotte has.
Been able to become nationally ranked at a pace that very
few have been able to become.
And when I'm asked, well, how have you all performed and done something with
such quickness, I really should go right back to my strategy philosophy.
It's getting teams energized and excited about what's ahead and helping
them have the tools to get there.
Host: Yeah, and it's really interesting because I think kind of ebbs and flows
sometimes across organizations where there'll be a big focus on the strategy
as a vision and then a departure from the operations and execution or, and then
sometimes it's really more, okay, we've gotta get our tactics figured out and
our metrics figured out, and you kind of lose sight sometimes of the vision.
So I think being able to think about it holistically like you're
talking about, is so important.
And I think that that is, obviously, it's.
It's evident in what you've been able to accomplish.
So I think that's phenomenal.
No, I
Guest 1: think it's really good call out in that.
I guess the other piece that I try to not do is distinguish two as two buckets.
Mm-hmm.
And I think that's partly why we see this sort of tension at times of
anchoring all the way back to laser focus in operations or looking up and
above, if you will, in the clouds.
And to me you can do both.
Yeah.
And should do both.
healthcare is complex.
It also comes with a high degree of, burnout, and to me, one of
the ways that we help teams.
Focus on the bright parts of healthcare is also reminding them,
let's not forget about our strategy.
Let's not forget about why we're here for the future and why we
wanna do today what we need to do, get ready for, for the future.
And I, I do think trying to connect the two is an important aspect,
particularly as we engage new leaders and younger generations within,
within the healthcare portfolio.
Host: Yeah.
So you mentioned it a little bit.
I touched on challenges within healthcare.
It is complex and it is ever changing.
I think even now, I feel like now more than ever, but I, I don't
know if you say that all the time.
It seems like it's just a constant thing.
It's true.
Right?
Guest 1: Is it more complicated today than it was before or, or not?
I, it feels like, and I agree,
Host: it's, it's certainly complicated today and challenging today.
Mm-hmm.
And I think we, there's a lot of headwinds.
I think we are all aware of that.
so I wanna talk a little bit about struggles and challenges, especially,
you know, for myself as a mom, I've noticed a desire to really try to smooth
out the road as much as possible to, we wanna make everything needs to be easy.
Bumps in the road are not good.
Challenges are not good.
Conflict is not good, but I do believe that there is learning.
Mm-hmm.
The challenge.
And so for you, I'm curious as you think about challenges or struggles, if there.
Instances that you would share where you had to face, certainly
challenging times, how that's shaped you, you know, have you navigated
those in your, in your career so far?
Guest 1: Well, it has certainly been a bumpy road, and one of the things I
think that we sometimes do ourselves a disservice when we talk about a career
trajectory or a pathway of what we've done is we sometimes project it in a way
that it's just been what you described.
Smooth road from one step to the next.
And, and the reality is as bumpy and as squiggly as roads are, I have
certainly healthcare as an industry had incredible amount of challenges.
You could think about the one that we all faced in 2020, right?
And I would say we're.
Still not fully recovered as an industry from COVID, and yet COVID is a good
example of how I, as a leader, try to think about challenges in that as
hard and difficult and uncertain as it was, there were equal number of
amazing, brilliant, beautiful moments.
I will forever be grateful for.
And so it's interesting how whatever a challenge is,
there are two sides to a coin.
And some of it is one's mental sort of model that they think
through challenges around.
And some of it is the realities of what's facing you.
But I do think when we are facing any of the headwinds, whether it's
changes in reimbursement, whether it's.
Changes in the perception of healthcare or clinicians nationally, right?
We're facing a lot and it's heavy.
And yet when you take a step back, particularly when you're as lucky as
I am, and that you're immersed within healthcare every day, and you look
for how people are putting the next foot in front of themselves, it's
a pretty powerful model to digest.
So when I practically try to be more immersed, when I'm facing
challenge, how do I look for it?
How do I feel the challenge?
How do I understand it in a way that perhaps.
Allows me to inspire individuals in the face of whatever our problem is.
So during COVID, we every single day for more than a year and a half huddled as a
team, we worked through problems together.
We tried to be as visible as we possibly could and tried to humanize the challenges
that were in front of us, and that works for any problem that we're with.
It does take some work you have to do on yourself to be able to
receive the problem and not take it.
Quite so personally and really take it as a challenge for, all right, this is
the next thing that's in front of us.
How are we together gonna be to better tomorrow than we
were yesterday through it?
Host: And I think that that's an interesting perspective because
it really is pivoting around the self-centeredness of me.
How is this affecting me?
To how can we together, collectively do something together?
It's, you
Guest 1: know, it's, it's lonely to problem solve alone.
It is, I mean, it is, right.
And so I'm always amazed sometimes when I get a chance to talk to a leader and
they're facing whatever it might be for the day or the week or the month.
And you start talking it out with them how cathartic it is by just
bouncing thoughts with someone.
And that seems, I mean, that's not very provocative.
Yeah.
But when you're knee deep into something, sometimes I think we forget how important
getting perspective from others is.
And so we tend to isolate and we tend to be lonely and try
to problem solve alone, right?
and yet when we take a minute and take a step back and pull people together,
it's a lot more enjoyable to have a team around you and to solve a problem with it.
Host: Yeah, but it also takes time.
So you have to have that team identified, right, and constructed.
So I think my next question is, as you've tackled challenges, as
you've looked at new opportunities as you've grown in your career.
How do you intentionally find, you know, obviously you have your team, but
how do you intentionally identify the people to surround yourself with, to
help you challenge your current thinking status, you know, to think different?
Is there intentionality around that and how do you really look for that sounding
Guest 1: board?
I think that's an area where I've really worked on and over
time, recognized how valuable the intentionality to what you just said is.
So sometimes we get lucky.
Mm-hmm.
Right?
In that we might have a team that's around us that's firing on all
cylinder and you realize, wow.
How did I get so lucky?
And other times we realize, wow, We're missing some voices.
And so I'll go back to a little bit about how I shared earlier in the
conversation in how we show up every day.
And so to me, I truly build my mental list by observing how
people are showing up every day.
I don't need everyone to be the subject matter expert
around whatever we're facing.
We will absolutely ensure.
That we put subject matter expertise at the table, but I need
someone who might be creative.
I might need someone who has a way of communicating, an inspiring way that gets.
Teams who want to listen.
There are so many different skill sets that we sometimes undervalue because we
tend to overvalue sometimes subject matter expertise in a problem solving scenario.
And so I have tried to build both my formal team, but also our larger expanded
team to be reflective of the types of ways we solve problems in healthcare.
We don't have only nurses, of course not.
We have physicians, we have therapists, we have child life leaders.
We have people who are doing different facets of healthcare in leadership roles.
Because I think by doing that, it diversifies the types of sort of DNA
that you have within your team, and then you look for those soft skills.
Host: Yeah, and I think that the word you used is interesting observing
people and how they're showing up.
And I think there's so much power in observation.
I think that going back to one of the earlier questions about how you were.
Background in being a nurse really kind of helps in your mm-hmm.
Role today.
'cause that is obviously a very critical skill set to have in clinical care.
Guest 1: You know?
That's true.
I haven't connected that.as
well as you just did.
I would also say, particularly in pediatrics, because most of the time
our patients can't speak for themselves.
Yeah.
And so you do have to hone your skills and observation.
What I certainly really, until today haven't really reflected on
is how much I do lean on that skill.
And I also would say equally, I am grateful for the leaders who saw my
potential, who also leaned on that skill because you could easily argue
that without a few people in my story taking a risk on me that I wouldn't be
sitting here because there were reasons.
Years of experience, subject matter, expertise, clinical training, whatever
it might have been, there were reasons people might have said, oh, well we
should find a different pedigree.
Mm-hmm.
And yet something gave them enough confidence in me that they said yes
and let me have the next chance.
And so I, really think it's almost, an obligation to be looking for
similar expertise, maybe long before you even know you're gonna need it.
Yeah.
Host: So you've spent your entire career here, right?
Within
Guest 1: Children's, yeah, within Children's.
Host: Um, at Atrium.
At Atrium in Carolinas.
Did you seen a lot of change?
Yeah, I was gonna say we've had a lot of change, a lot of, um, and a lot
Guest 1: of great change.
I think the organization itself has been a great example of transforming
oneself to being prepared for the realities of what healthcare looks like.
So while I've worked.
Technically for the same organization.
In some ways, I feel like I've had these many chapters of different organizations
that have challenged me to be a different leader than I was in the prior chapter.
Host: Yeah, and that's a really interesting point.
I live here, so I've seen the organization grow and change, uh, from the outside.
but yeah, that's a really interesting point I hadn't thought about before.
But I think that takes a lot of resiliency to be able to kind of take those changes
as they come to grow in your career within an organization, even another organization
as an organization, continues to change.
So thinking about resiliency and then obviously the resiliency.
You need to be a clinical caregiver to pediatrics and incredibly complex
patients that have families that come with it, and all these other kind of
dynamics that it comes with taking care of these really, really special patients.
So thinking about resiliency, how are you caring for yourself?
Like what are some of the things that you do to make sure that you are exemplifying
that trait of caring for yourself mm-hmm.
And, and showing that for your team.
Guest 1: Really great question, and I wish I could sit here and tell
you that I have figured it out.
I'm really
Host: looking for answers guys.
Um, but I haven't.
Guest 1: Um, but I'll, I'll give you some reflections, some nuggets
that I've learned along the way that have been helpful for me.
I genuinely believe you have to have work that provides.
View your own internal joy.
Mm-hmm.
I think that's a place to start.
I think sometimes we don't take a moment to reflect, is the work that
I'm doing creating a sense of joy or pride or positive energy to start with?
Because the days there are going to be hard days in any job we have, right?
And so if you can start there, that's a good place to start.
Secondly, I have never been a big believer in work life balance.
So I'm a mom, I have two children.
I've.
Really grown up in my leadership career as my children have been growing, and
I believe that I am a better leader if I am feeling as though I've been the
best mom I know to be and vice versa.
And so I had tried really early in my career to let go of some of the guilt.
And I say that because I think sometimes resiliency is eaten away.
That's sort of these like micro guilt that we all might prescribe to.
And have I done that perfectly every day?
No.
But every day's a new day, right?
And every week's a new moment.
And so sometimes we win, sometimes we lose and then we get ourselves back up.
But I really have tried to immerse my philosophy and my team knows, I talk about
it a lot around work life integration.
And the reason why I think that's been important for me
through the lens of resiliency is that I never wanted to create.
A scenario where there were winners or losers, and I wanted to try to the best
of my ability to help my family understand why this work brought me joy and why there
were days that I needed to prioritize, say, work over, maybe something that I
felt like I could do differently in life.
Vice versa.
I wanted my work team to appreciate for myself as it makes me a better leader, but
also hopefully role modeling for them too.
That they too need to show up big for whatever it means.
And if that's your family, great.
A private organization that you're a member of, great.
Whatever it is that you need.
To make you a better self, we need to prioritize that too.
And so I really see it as like this just complete puzzle that just gets integrated.
And so where possible, if I was at a community event and it was
appropriate for my children to come, they came where possible.
If I needed to leave in the middle of the day to go watch
my kids perform something I did.
And now I can tell you that I think that's partly why.
I tend to have a little bit more resiliency.
I've really worked hard personally at understanding when I was feeling off.
I also have some accountability partners around me that will say, Callie,
you look like you need some rest.
and that's okay.
I really am like, you're right, I do thank you.
Well, now how weird do we go get that?
And so, you know, I guess my advice.
Around whatever it is that allows you to have your cup filled more than
one way is that we really try to be intentional about filling it because
I have found in the, some of the darkest, hardest moments in work, I'm
not pouring from a fully empty cup.
Host: Yeah.
I love that work-life integration.
'cause I, I do have a challenge with balance, that phrase, so I,
I love thinking about it that way.
I also agree, I'm a mom of teenagers and so I think accountability.
I mean, for me anyway, they are the best accountability.
Aren't they part for me, aren't they?
No trouble telling me when I'm off balance or need to be pivoting.
So what a blessing, right?
So yeah,
Guest 1: sometimes we have to remind ourself that it's
actually a blessing, but yes.
That's amazing.
Host: It's amazing.
Well then, but thinking about that, you know, so you have children,
and this is one of my favorite questions to ask like you, is.
If you had to go back to coming out of Chapel Hill for that first engagement
in the nicu, or even looking at your kids now as they're entering into.
The next chapter of their lives.
What advice would you have for yourself to that Cali back then?
Yes.
Guest 1: I've thought about this a good bit and I don't know why I've thought
about this recently, but I have thought about if I were to tell my younger
self something, what would it be?
And this comes to mind, I think I would tell myself to take a
breath and slow down a minute.
Now, I've challenged that thought because I'm like, would I have
really been able to and still be.
In the spot that I'm in.
I don't know what I mean by that.
Sort of like, take your breath and slow down a minute is sometimes
when we are goal focused sort of incrementally trying to meet that next
strategy that's ahead of ourselves.
'cause as I mentioned before, I really try to put those two pieces
together today, makes tomorrow better.
And so when you think that way, sometimes you're always thinking about tomorrow.
And what I would hope I could teach myself is that it's okay to feel today.
A little bit more.
And so I can't undo, and I don't even know that I want to, but I do try to
now think through what about today went really well and can I feel today
a little bit more than worrying already about what is happening at the end
of the week or next week or whatever.
So I think the other thing that I would tell myself is that.
There is a pathway, and it is okay that the pathway may not
be fully what you think it is.
Feel it, experience it.
Be bold enough to ask for opportunities to be exposed to different facets of
whether it's healthcare or another industry, to see if there's something
about yourself you haven't yet learned.
Because I never dreamed I'd be sitting here, and I'm grateful
that through sort of this.
Combination of skill and will that I got here and yet had people not poked a few
of the things I didn't know I was good at.
I don't know that I would've found it naturally.
So I would certainly tell myself to embrace those things.
Host: Looking back, as you're sitting in the chair today, what are some of the
standup moments from your career so far?
Guest 1: To me, they're, some of our first, so I'm lucky that I
have an opportunity to work across North Carolina and Georgia, but
my home base with Charlotte and I have shared that there's milestones
along the story that others are.
Surprised that we've achieved.
And so I can remember distinctly the very first time we were ranked nationally
and we were a baby children's hospital.
Yeah.
And people might think, oh, okay, well that's just an
award that you're excited by.
And it had nothing honestly to do with the award.
It has everything to do with, we executed on a plan that made care.
Better.
And we ultimately had designed around a vision for the future.
Mm-hmm.
That made me the most excited.
It actually just happened last year.
It's the first time that Levine Children's Hospital has been ranked into specialties
and actually tied as being the number one children's hospital in the Southeast.
And again, not about the award, about saying that in 17 years.
We have inch by inch, block by block, taken the best of the best
and made it our own, and ultimately through the lens of others saying.
Wow, they're doing something that deserves for people to know.
There's confidence in choosing here to have your child's care, and it
doesn't get much better than that.
my milestones tend to always be the underbelly of the how we achieve
something, because I feel like otherwise it's just hope, wish, dream.
We don't really know how we got there.
And so to me, the milestones that I will always be proud of and always
look for are the ones where we had a defined pathway and we got there.
Host: Yeah.
Meeting those goals and the confidence that that brings.
And the pride.
The pride,
Guest 1: to me.
The pride, right.
Really deeply thinking about what would make care better.
And I am biased because I'm a children's healthcare leader
and nurse through and through.
What better place to make an impact than caring for children who one day are
gonna grow up and be the next generation of decision makers in this country?
And so it's an obligation, but a really, really awesome opportunity.
Host: You can feel it when you walk into the building.
You can see it in everybody's eyes from the security desk, the receptionist.
You can feel it in these walls that there's something special happening.
So kudos to you and your teeth.
Well, thank you.
So great.
Well, obviously, I mean that's advice to this point now, but you
have so much ahead of you, right?
So you're just getting started and so what's next for you?
what are you looking forward to?
Guest 1: I'm really excited about what's ahead and maybe that's this like,
twisted scenario of we've got a lot of headwinds and I'm gonna try to be the
internal optimist as much as I can be.
And so I'll own that.
Yeah, but I love a good challenge, and so what I'm most excited about
within the organization is helping shape what we can do with Children's
in a larger national scale.
There are challenges that pediatric patients particularly face around.
How many hubs across the country there are to get care?
I love some of the advancements in our ability to care for
patients through technology.
I think it is a differentiator, but I also think it's in an enabler to access,
and so I am really excited about some of the ideas that we have about truly
walking the walk of bringing care closer to home and finding unique.
High quality, high experience ways to solve for the deserts that exist for
pediatric healthcare, and I think I'm well positioned in this organization to try
out a model that maybe doesn't exist yet.
Host: I love that.
Well, Callie, I thank you so much for the time.
This has been really amazing.
It's been such a great conversation.
I just really appreciate you taking the time to do this.
Well,
Guest 1: thank you.
I really, really enjoyed our time as well.