Leadership, Learning, and Engagement

During Sound Physicians’ National Leadership Conference (NLC) we caught up with one of Sound’s physician leaders, Dr. Hesham A. Hassaballa, to chat about leadership, development, and driving physician engagement.

What is Sound Physicians’ National Leadership Conference about?
Taking care of patients at the bedside drives me, but I also want to grow as a leader. Our annual NLC is an event that brings together clinical and business leaders for an interactive, two-day learning event in support of leadership development and new skills that we quickly bring back to our hospital partners. This year’s conference took place in Phoenix, AZ, and the theme was “Evolve,” fitting, given the pace of change in healthcare, as well as the many innovations taking place at Sound Physicians. While our themes change year-to-year, the mantra that guides NLC is “educate, motivate, and celebrate!”

Can you tell us about some of the specific learning sessions?
Each day starts with general sessions where our 600+ attendees hear from our executive team on Sound’s performance, strategy, and priority trends in healthcare. We also bring in keynote speakers from outside of the organization. After main-tent presentations, we attend workshops based on our interests and needs. This year’s offerings included strengthening the relationship with the hospital C-Suite, telemedicine, advanced practice provider integration, population health, mastering the team meeting, and how to be a resilient leader.

What makes NLC so dynamic?
One of the greatest things about NLC is the ability to network and learn from leaders across Sound. A powerful example is our National Clinical Innovation Session (NCIS), the culmination of a yearlong program where colleagues innovate around improving patient outcomes. Skilled mentors work with participants to guide them through project design and implementation. Projects are presented at the conference and the winning one pilots across the organization.

NCIS helps us tap into the vast talent from all our clinical roles. Winning projects at this year’s NCIS included the creation of a simulation lab to help improve the patient experience, a project that helped reduce readmissions in the congestive heart failure population, and a patient empowerment project that improved the discharge process in one of our programs.

What does “celebrating” look like during NLC?
NLC crescendos with a grand black-tie gala. It’s Sound Physicians version of the Oscars in which we celebrate successes! A highlight for me is our “Core Values” awards in which we recognize colleagues who have made outstanding contributions to quality, service, teamwork, innovation, and integrity. The presentation of Sound’s Summit award, which recognizes an individual who best embodies all our core values, caps off this amazing evening. Our gala showcases physician leadership at its best!

What makes Sound Physicians a unique organization for clinicians?
Sound Physicians makes significant investments in its colleagues. Ultimately, all this investment and engagement helps us continue to improve outcomes and deliver even more value to our hospital partners. I especially love how anyone at Sound, who wants to raise his or her hand to help make things better, have opportunities to do so.

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