A conversation with new hospital CEO Ken Graham

By John Flood, Town Crier Staff Writer

One of Ken Graham’s major challenges will be overseeing the rebuilding project at the hospital.

In June, the El Camino Hospital (ECH) Board of Directors appointed Ken Graham CEO. Graham has 35 years’ experience in the health-care industry, the past 12 as president and CEO of Overlake Hospital Medical Center in Bellevue, Wash.

Graham helped transform Overlake from a small community hospital into a growing regional medical center noted for quality patient care. His achievements there included planning and managing extensive hospital construction projects.

Graham earlier was an administrator at Long Beach Community Hospital, Grossmont Hospital in the San Diego area and the Daughters of Charity National Health System, West Region. He holds bachelor’s and master’s degrees in public health from UCLA.

The Town Crier interviewed him recently about the future of El Camino Hospital.

TC: What expertise do you bring to this position that is uniquely geared to the needs of ECH?

Graham: My background includes working with boards and management development. One of my strengths is an extensive background in construction and program development and in developing new services and sys-

tems. I’m here to extend and continue El Camino’s tradition.

TC: So, you are not here to be a revolutionary? You are continuing its present course?

Graham: We’ll have a steady course forward. There will be more focus on science and medicine and a very successful development of the new facilities. … We’ll match the new physical facility with great doctors and great nurses.

TC: Doesn’t this hospital have a tradition in science and technology?

Graham: Yes, it was a hospital selected in the early 1970s to benefit from some of the computers that were used in the early space programs. That led the way for medical records automation in American hospitals.

TC: Apart from managing hospital records, how is ECH using new technology for patient care?

Graham: Many of our departments have new devices and services new to health care. We have a fully automated lab with robotic methods that provide safe, efficient, accurate lab results.

ECH has a voice-activated communications system that allows hospital personnel to call anyone by name in the hospital, hands-free, without having to pick up a hallway telephone and use a paging system. This is a very innovative process.

TC: What made you decide to join ECH?

Graham: It was a family opportunity. We have lived here since 1984, and we have a home in Los Altos Hills. My children went away to college, and they all moved back here and now live here with their children. This was a great opportunity to reunite the family. I gave up a wonderful job in Seattle to take another wonderful job here.

TC: Why did they hire you?

Graham: I’d like to think it was because I can relate well to people. I can put up with ambiguity better than most, and I’m pretty determined. I also have a good track record of working with science and medicine. I’m interested in patient safety. I’m a fanatic about it.

TC: How do you describe your management style?

Graham: I have two approaches: One is the authoritative leader in turnaround situations. I don’t need to use that here because the hospital is doing quite well. Here I use transformational work, asking for adult conversations about how we do the work and the meaning of what we’re doing, and calling out for clarity about our destinations.

TC: It sounds like you have a high level of trust in the people who work for you.

Graham: I believe everyone is competent until they prove otherwise.

TC: What are your top three priorities?

Graham: First, to ensure the construction project is conducted safely, efficiently and is paid for effectively.

Secondly, we are going to be presiding over the new transition to medical technology and medical automation, and we aim to continue to lead the hospital industry with medical records and physician order entry.

A third area is to continue to lead and apply new science and medicine that’s being invented.

This is a great community to work in because people here have high expectations for medical care. We expect to delight them.

TC: What are your challenges?

Graham: Even though ECH is outperforming nearly every hospital in the Bay Area, there is a constant challenge to deal with the continuous layering of regulation and unfunded mandates from the government and regulatory agencies.

It’s a challenge to deal with the high cost of real estate to recruit new doctors and staff to this area.

We’re trying to support and introduce innovation and great medicine. There is an insatiable demand for the latest thing now, and in that environment, we are trying to provide an outstanding product.

There are other things new to health care that we continue to monitor - catastrophe planning, a much bigger deal now with the issues raised by the Department of Homeland Security. Hurricane Katrina has created an expectation that hospitals aren’t just receiving hospitals but first responders and should provide critical resources that go well beyond medical care in catastrophes.

The whole medical environment in the Bay Area is dominated by corporate medical systems like Kaiser Permanente, Sutter Health and Catholic Healthcare West. Making our way as a freestanding hospital will require us to live by our wits and outperform to remain relevant surrounded by these corporate giants. On the other hand, our advantage is that we can provide the most personal and responsive care because we are closer to the community and we have a community-oriented board of directors.

TC: Do you think that the corporate health-care giants aren’t as accountable as ECH?

Graham: Transparency is an industrywide challenge. … Health care is under scrutiny. … The difference is their corporate offices aren’t being examined by the local newspapers and local media as much as the public entity in a local community. We are trying to be accessible and candid with our strengths and our weaknesses.

TC: There’s seems to be a lot of goodwill about this hospital.

Graham: There’s a tremendous amount of community support for this hospital. The evidence is the volunteer staff. We have over 850 volunteers. That’s twice as many as a hospital this size would be expected to draw.

TC: What would you like them to say about you after you leave ECH?

Graham: That the hospital is a lot better off than when I got here.

TC: Do you anticipate a day when the employees here say we want an all-union shop? And does that trouble you?

Graham: That doesn’t trouble me at all. What we’re doing is trying to follow due process, not only for the union members but also for the people who have selected not to be in a union. And when we get done with that due process, we are going to do whatever the employees and the regulators have decided should be done at ECH. And we will be forthright and straightforward about working in that environment.

TC: Do you think they want an all-union shop?

Graham: I don’t know what they want. This is a process that includes a variety of organizations, and the main issue with state bill 759 is the idea of whether we’re going to be acting like a public organization. Whether we’re a government entity, or a not-for-profit, we all want to be forthright and straightforward, and we’re going to be that way.

TC: In this somewhat charged atmosphere, is it your role to defuse that emotional atmosphere?

Graham: The contention has been exaggerated in the public and in the press to some degree. There is a need for us to listen and to respond and to communicate with our critics and to address their concerns reasonably and forthrightly. There has been a lot of that in the past, and there will be more in the future.

If you walk down the halls around here, you would say that this is one of the warmest, most satisfying places you’ve ever been. And employee satisfaction has been reported to be the top in the whole country. This is not a bad place to work. It is a very appreciated place to work.

We have 2,300 employees and everyone has an opinion. But we are all here to serve the patient and make sure the district residents and the community are getting what they’re paying for.

TC: Did this highly charged issue around unionizing and transparency surprise you when you came here?

Graham: This was no surprise. It doesn’t trouble me a bit, and I’m familiar with the issues. This will be worked through.

There is a great story inside the ECH. The more people see it, the more they’re going to love this hospital.