Earlier this month, the merged Beaumont-Spectrum health system was renamed Corewell Health. And with it, the top executive hopes to take a fresh look at its operations in Southeast Michigan.
A lot happened leading up to the new name, including management’s accelerated efforts to integrate the two systems and remedy the financial bleeding from Beaumont’s previous operations.
For years, sources have discussed top doctors from Beaumont moving to competing hospitals in the state under its former leadership, and that flow has continued since the merger.
Crain spoke with Corewell President and CEO Tina Freese Decker about the new name, addressing financial and labor issues in Southeast Michigan, and what the state should expect from its largest health system. yourself in the future.
The Corewell name has been met with some complaints, especially after parting with the Spectrum brand. How do you feel about the new name and its place in healthcare?
We feel really good about it. We know it’s a big change and it takes time for people to get used to the new name, but we’re proud of the team that put this together. Coming up with a new name is a surprising challenge, but the process is amazing. We got our team members to take surveys, and that name really comes from our team members. Surveys show that 60% of our team members suggested we come up with a new name [the merged system was temporarily named BHSH System]. So people will get over it, and the name will be a vision of health changed in the future.
For the first six months of 2022, the Beaumont side of the business reported a loss of $100 million. How does that impact integration efforts and how are you trying to regulate finances?
Coming together creates so many opportunities to build a strong organization across the state. We are well underway with our integration efforts and have achieved a lot in just nine months. Our finances have improved. Honestly, it takes time to move forward and navigate the difficulties all hospitals are facing to move forward. One area where we have made a big investment is in our people. We want to make sure we keep people in our system and attract people to our organization. We have made market adjustments to wages and established new partnerships with educational institutions (Grand Valley State University and others). We are also sharing best practices system-wide and have recently invested in surgical robotics, our IT and digital domains to enable us to operate more efficiently.
Shortly after the Beaumont financials came out, Corewell announced 400 system-wide job cuts in non-technical positions. Can we expect more cuts?
In September, when we made that announcement, it was part of us that was accelerating our consolidation work. We’ve limited those cuts to specialist roles where there’s redundancy. We are continuing to hire people for patient-facing roles. We are making encouraging progress with the integration process. We’ve done a lot of culture shaping work, focused on providing care. And because we have Priority (Corewell’s integrated health insurer), we’re continuing to work on what we can do for value. Once again, we have invested millions of dollars in our IT systems to make it robust and provide seamless care. It really comes together to make it a high quality system. Now we are flying and we are starting to see the benefits to come.
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Beaumont has lost links with top doctors for many years, and we have been informed that it continues under Corewell. Is there anything being done to solve the problem?
In Southeast Michigan specifically, hiring a talented leader is essential. I am very proud that we have recruited Dr. Ben Schwartz. He went to meetings to work things out, and those conversations went very well. There’s been a lot of talk and action going on, especially since Dr. Schwartz joined us (on July 5). We strive to be the best place to work and where doctors want to practice and want to return to practice. I think in three to five years, we’ll be looking at this as the point where we start to create positive conditions for people to exercise in Southeast Michigan.
Beaumont’s headquarters in Southfield seemed an obvious accident of integration. It’s a large building, and the workforce there hasn’t returned to the office full-time yet. Are there any plans to escape the building?
We intend to always have a significant presence in this location (Southeastern Michigan). Just last week I attended a nursing instruction session in Southfield and there were a number of people coming in for an educational partnership and I noticed everyone’s excitement in joining our organization. There’s a lot going on in the building and it’s about collaborating and pushing us forward.
There are clear cultural differences between the western and eastern parts of the state. Is that hard to navigate during the integration?
We are all Michigands. I see that we go into a room, come together to talk about problems and come to solutions. We usually walk away with that solution. We took a survey very early on and asked those questions about the process and decision making and honestly we expected to see more of a difference. There aren’t any major differences. We all want the same thing. The survey says we are more alike than we are different. That’s very encouraging and I’m excited about the future.
This story first appeared in our sister publication, Crain’s Detroit Business.
