Well, hello and welcome to another episode of the Growth Edge Leadership Podcast. I am your host, Laurie Baedke and I've been looking forward to today's conversation for a while. am joined by a colleague, Andrew Wade. Andrew and I met a handful or more of years ago through a national leadership development program. and I've just admired him from afar. We've unfortunately never had the pleasure to meet in person, but you know, sometimes when you get to interact with colleagues and you can tell that they are extraordinary leaders and you can tell that they're your people, Andrew definitely checks that box. He is the CEO of OrthoSC, Ortho South Carolina. He is a triple board certified fellow of both the American, I'm gonna pause.
He is a triple board certified healthcare executive and has an MBA and a Doctorate in Healthcare Administration. He is just a phenomenal human being, but I'll let you fill in the blanks. Andrew, welcome. Offer a little bit of color commentary and introducing yourself to the listener before we dig in.
Yeah, well thank you so much for having me. It's a lot of really, really kind words. I'm Andrew. I've been in the orthopedic practice management leadership space. I guess I'm going to 17 years now and I have no idea how that happened. It feels like I just showed up at a practice in a community that I was a part of a year or two ago.
Worked in a lot of different roles and been been fortunate to get to serve in a lot of different ways over time I think the big summary of who I am is I'm just a guy who enjoys helping move things forward and I've had the Opportunity to do that in a lot of different ways And in a ways that serve my community here locally at home but also regionally and nationally through different organizations and so I think my story is one of being given opportunities and being willing to step through the door and
see where they go and it's just been a really really neat ride and I think hopefully looking forward to quite a few more years of getting to do the same and hopefully bring in some more people along the way in the process too.
Yeah. that's fantastic. And I think that one of the things that has always been admirable to me and that has kind of attracted me to the things that you post on LinkedIn or content that you share, it's evident that you are a lifelong learner. It's something that is, you you and I share that. But when you think about that and the way that it has shaped your leadership over time, what strikes you or what would you share about the format, your formation as a leader today. And as you go forward, as it pertains to your passion for learning and your curiosity.
Yeah, yeah, so. I think one of the fascinating things about learning is that it's, you know, it's, it's an opportunity is really what it is, right? The world never stays still. It's always changing, always evolving. And so there's always something else to figure out. I was joking with the team member earlier this morning that somewhere, somewhere along the way, it's not going to be anytime soon, but I would really love to learn more about electric, HVAC and plumbing. It feels like those are totally opposite of the space that I work in every day, but it's always fascinating whenever I need to change a light switch. or something like that. It's just another area that I don't know a ton about. And so you look around you and there's just endless opportunities out there for figuring out why and how and you what drives the world that's happening around us. And so for me, I think I've always been kind of bent that way, always just been sort of driven to not feel like I had arrived or not feel like I had figured enough out or made it anywhere. And somewhere along the way, just, I realized that it's really about enjoying the journey more than it is getting to some destination with a degree or credentials or a job or something like that. And the beautiful thing is the people that you get to meet along along the way, the opportunities that you get to be a part of really meaningful, great work, and just the stuff that you get to be involved in. you know, in our space and the world that we work in, it's really cool. I the work that we do matters. You know, it's a part of communities that are jam full of people who they have a name, they have a story, their family members, sons, daughters. You know, it's really easy to get lost in the aggregate when we think about society as a whole. But every person is an individual with a story and has meaning people that care about them, the people that they care about. And when you try to zero in, it's really neat that we get to be a part of their story and helping them live a better life, helping them have more access.
Yeah, I think that that is so true. And you're touching on something that I hope we have time before we're done today to get to, which is just the humanity of leadership and that it is so relational. It's not transactional. And so, so much of it is, is what we learn from others, what we give to others. But let's stay on this topic of learning for just another moment, because you've clearly learned a lot, learned about the profession, watched a lot of change.
you also acquired credentials and degrees along that path. But I'm guessing that you probably also perhaps have left some things on the sideline. Is there something that you can think of that you've had to unlearn as you have advanced in your career or maybe ascended in leadership?
Yeah, I think I'm forever having to unlearn. I don't know that I could tell you a single one thing. It feels like there's something new every day because the truth is, like every new day is a new challenge, right? And every... every day that we wake up and come to work, come to whatever it is that we're doing with our time, the playbook that worked yesterday doesn't work quite the same as it did the day before, right? And so we have to, it's not necessarily that we completely wholesale throw everything away and start anew, but we have to continually iterate, continually evolve in the way we're approaching and thinking. And so I think... even now looking back to some of the things that were just gospel truth in my early bachelor's days, those thought processes, those techniques, those things are not necessarily reality anymore as the world is much more connected, much more global, much more widely dispersed in the way that it thinks and approaches problems. And so I think it is always, it's as much about learning as it is about being willing to rethink something that you assumed to be truth yesterday.
Yeah. Well, because there are just limits to what we've been exposed to or what we've known before. And someone next to us, whether it diverse in any way, maybe a different generation, a different racial or ethnic upbringing, any of the ways that someone can be diverse to us can broaden our understanding. And we realized that perhaps we were limited and that there's just more to understand. so I just think there is such a huge business case for curiosity and humility. in all of our approaches in every single step of the journey to just have our ear to the ground and our eyes and mind open to think what can someone share with me that I didn't know before that will make me better because of it.
Yep, agree 100%.
Yeah, because healthcare is so dynamic and disrupted when I think I'm about a decade farther into my career than you. But I say so often that the healthcare industry that I entered in the late nineties is night and day different from the one that we live in today. And that pace or velocity of change is only increasing. So the titles that exist in our world, the realities from a regulatory or a reimbursement or any perspective.
You are changing all the time. And if we look ahead through the windshield, you know that they're going to change even more. the types of roles that we're going to be interdependent with or the skills that we're going to be valuing, some of them are going to be enduring, but many of them, we have to just be open-minded to think, what's it going to look like next? Because I don't have a crystal ball, do you?
No, no, I don't think so. I think we have to keep looking at the data that's around us, right? I mean, we have to keep our, and maybe that's a part of the leadership and part of learning, right? Is it's being proactive and looking for.
We may not have pristine clarity on what it is, but we can see the edges of the horizons, if you will, and the faster that we are able to begin at least quantifying a framework of what that might look like, the quicker that we can translate that into understanding and learning that then helps our organization prepare for what's coming next. Because it feels like it's only happened faster, certainly in the last decade, and I can't see anything that would indicate that it's going to slow down at this point. And so that old adage about it, I think it was an old Charles Darwin
quote or at least it's attributed to him right it's not the strongest or the smartest that are the ones who survive and thrive it's those who are most adaptive most able to reinvent change think differently as new things evolve around us.
Yes.
Yeah, well, that is a perfect bridge to kind of the next thing I wanted to queue you up for is just talk to us a little bit about your career path and what has that adaptability and just kind of being resourceful or raising your hand for opportunities or just embracing new challenges. What has that looked like in your role in the current organization, but just in your career path at large?
Yeah, so I started.
My very first role was a first impressions team member helping patients in an MRI unit in one of the practice locations, schedule appointments, get checked in for appointments, get in and out of a machine and all that kind of good stuff. And so I've stepped through a bunch of different roles since then and had the opportunity to see a lot. And I think it's been a gift because it means that I can think from more than just my leader's chair, if you will. And it's helped a lot.
me a lot over the years to go ask the question of my team members, hey this makes sense logically but what's that showing up like for you on the front lines where care is happening, where problems are out, where challenges show up and you know we don't always have the ability to alter course.
But sometimes you can, and sometimes it makes all the difference in the world to be able to readapt and re-evolve the logic just a little bit so that you make it easier, cleaner, smoother, faster for your team members, which turns into giving them the ability to better serve your patients or your customers, right? Which is why we're here for. Again, the whole point and purpose of it all is that we want people to have a good experience, but we want them to go away better than they came to us. We want to be a part of helping people go back to what drives them.
and what they love about life.
It's part of what's so neat about what we get to do. I think the thing that's pushed me to change is one, just opportunity, right? I grew up in a, I'm gonna call it a unique time. I helped the first practice that I was a part of through its very first EHR transition. So there was a period of time where I was chasing paper charts around in preparation for the following day and helped move through the whole technology transition that happened with that.
Still not sure that we've perfectly gotten that figured out yet. And I'm sure many of your listeners will commiserate from the healthcare space. In our paperless world, there is still more paper than I've ever seen. And that doesn't seem to have gone away either, nor have fax machines. But it's this constant push to look for a little more, right? The realization and the recognition that, hey, this is a cool thing that I get to be a part of, but I bet I could do a little bit more by learning a little bit more, exploring a little bit
more and just realizing that humans seem to be naturally driven to colonize, to tribalize, right? But the truth of the matter is, like what plays out in a society around us at large is also true for organizations. And it's really easy if we're not careful to get siloed in our thinking and our working and our function in organizations. And the reality is, is patients don't see any of that. They see the one experience, right? They may touch a bunch of different players
Yes.
and people through the organization, but they see one experience. so keeping people connected to the reality that we are all interdependent upon each other to be able to do what we do successfully at scale, at speed. And when we can think from that posture, and instead of thinking about how we protect the silo, thinking about how that we connect the organization and bring people together in the way that they think, the way that they work, the way that they move.
the more everything around you moves faster or better or more efficient. And so I've just been pushed and I guess my organization has not had the good sense to get rid of me yet. And I keep just working through different roles and trying new things.
Yeah, that's awesome. So paint a picture just a little bit of the size and girth of your practice. You are in an independent orthopedic surgery practice. so independent practices, private physician practices, not nearly as common as they have been historically, unfortunately, but it is still prevalent within your subspecialty. But talk a little bit about the growth of the organization over your tenure with it and what it looks like today.
Yep. Yep.
from a complexity and a scope perspective.
Yeah, so we.
We started when I showed up around 2009 or so is what were three separate organizations who were serving a multi-county region up in the northeastern tip of South Carolina came together in 2018 to form what is worth Ortho SC today. And so we are five locations working on our six to open this fall a little over 450 team members across the organization. think we're, I think it's 34 physicians and I think 100
and 106 clinicians with an MPI, people who are treating patients at, you know, across all the different types of clinicians that are a part of our team.
And so we've grown a lot in response to a community that has grown a lot. And so, you know, we have the good fortune to be in a space where there are a lot of people coming to the area. you go look and go look at Horry County and Georgetown County, kind of that Northeastern beach front of South Carolina. It's a really rapidly growing area. So a lot of families, a lot of retirees, a lot of people who need care. And so we've, I feel like we have been behind the eight ball the whole time, just
trying to keep up as people are coming to the area. We have four health care system partners in the community that are with us. They all have employed physicians groups as well. And so none of us can keep up. I mean, we are all running to just to be able to serve our community well, which is great problem to have, right? I it's a wonderful problem and it keeps us in competition, which means that the community is always being leveled up in the service and the access that it's going to have because we're working to compete in the natural system around us.
is working the way that it's supposed to. And so, yeah.
Yeah, that's amazing. So obviously you have observed and at times led some really significant growth, market expansion, service lines, capital deployment. I mean, you say that you don't think that you were probably out in front of it. I'm sure it's felt like you're chasing to keep up. But on the other hand, my hunch is that you've probably been a lot more proactive and progressive than maybe you're giving yourself in the practice credit for. But yeah.
That's probably fair.
all of that growth, how do you, or kind of collectively the practice at large, how do you balance growth with sustainability so that you and the entire team doesn't burn out? Because it can be really, really hard to constantly be keeping pace.
is it is totally dynamic tension. I think the concept of balance to me, I don't know that I've found it yet and I'm not sure that I'm going to find it. I think I really am starting to kind of veer towards it's more about giving the right attention to the right thing in the right moment.
than it is about seeking 50 % here, 50 % there, or anything like that. It's just that model doesn't seem to work, or at least I haven't figured out how to make it work yet.
And so for me, it's really been about, this, think it flows to the entirety of our organization. It certainly flows to my leadership team. And then what I'm investing in them, hoping that they will do that for their team that they lead is that we are first and foremost here to take care of our patients. That's why we exist. It's why we open our doors every day. And I tell people, if you stay in this organization and this community long enough, you'll find yourself walking past people out in the community that you helped take care of. You may not, may be like me,
ever lay hands on a patient again, right? And I joke that the whole community is better off because I don't touch patients. But you had a hand and it doesn't matter where that was. I mean, you might've been answering the phone or working on billing stuff or taking x-rays or doing surgery or whatever it is, but you had a hand in helping take care of that patient. So that's our North Star. But to do that well, we have to take care of our people too, right? And so it's trying to create a culture and an environment, not family.
I always get nervous when people start calling their organizations families. But it is an organization that is respectful to our people, that's kind to our people, that understands that life happens, right? And that means that we work to pivot around people, not if, but when life shows up, you know? And so that doesn't mean that people stay forever. I joke with my team only half-heartedly, but I tell especially my leadership team.
Andrew Wade (18:04.726)
It's unlikely that you'll be able to stay here forever. You'll probably outgrow us. And I'm going to hide under my desk and cry for a little while when that day comes. But I'm also going to cheer for you because that means that you're taking the next step. It means that you're taking another move into hopefully a bigger, broader role. We're going to take the skills that you learned, keep growing, keep learning, keep advancing. And ultimately it comes back again to that means that our patients in our community get better care, right?
Yeah.
I'm not a karma guy, but thus far that mentality seems to have really served our organization incredibly well in that we've tried hard and are certainly a work in progress and will always be.
we've continually found that people come, people go, but it's much more about thinking about the access to leadership, access to talent, access to operating intellect for our community than it is about trying to protect that silo here that is OrthoSC. And so it's been a fascinating thing to watch, but I would argue we've got an incredibly gifted team, an incredibly compassionate, caring team, and they show up to take care of our patients
Regardless of where they're doing that from and it makes a difference in the community that we're a part of.
Yeah, it really does. And I just, I really appreciate the sentiment of what you're sharing because it's a constant tension between a strong pursuit and necessity of performance excellence, growth, expansion, facilitating the contributions of everyone within your team to give an excellent, as excellent as possible, an outcome, but while still valuing the human, the individual that contributes to that and acknowledging that
Perfection is impossible. But so much of what you were saying really resonated with me because it aligns with everything that I'm hearing and reading around us about purpose and meaning. And as much as only we can protect and sustain our individual capacity to rise up to the challenges, the workload, the complexity, the uncertainty, et cetera, when we are focused on something outside of ourselves, it inevitably...
has a paradoxical return to our motivation and energy to serve someone else. And so our tendency can be, and again, we have to be protective of our own capacity, but so much of leadership is pointing individuals to a broader meaning, a broader purpose, serving the patients you serve, serving the community and the multi-county, multi-service area that you're
that you're standing up to the challenges of access and doing so in constantly disrupted times that we live in. I just love that framing to kind of zoom out of yourself. are, like, does that resonate with what motivates you to lead in that way?
It does. And I think there's two things that stand out in that. One, I think that for a long time, I believed that those two drivers were mutually exclusive. I think I would have argued that, if the organization is going to be really hard nosed about the bottom line and the access and the metrics, that they're not going to be kind or healthy for people.
And I'm not even willing to say that we don't have seasons where we have veered too far into one or the other, right? But it really is about continuing that dynamic tension of pulling and steering and pulling and steering to keep it as close to center as you can. But honestly, that seems to be where you really find, I'm going to call it the magic combination if you will, because the reality is, like if we were, call it too nice, a wild over generalization there, right? But if we were too nice as an organization,
but we were ineffective at serving our patients, we wouldn't be here for very long, right? And in the exact same breath, if we were super focused on the outcome, super focused on the bottom line, and that's all we thought about to the expense of our people, we also wouldn't be here for very long because we wouldn't be able to keep the talent, we wouldn't be able to keep great team members, we would be an environment that just chewed people up and spit them out. And that's not what we want to be.
Yeah, yeah, absolutely. And I think just so much of that is, it's something you learn as you go, but some of it is innate within you. And I'm sure some of that's been modeled by individuals that have either mentored you or whose leadership that you have admired and then chosen to adopt. And definitely you have alluded to a strong mentorship developer tendency.
both in your day job as a CEO, but of course we haven't even talked about the fact that as an academic you are teaching secondary to your day job as well and really investing in developing the next generation of leaders, which I'm deeply passionate about as well. But when that is your mindset, so much of how we are formed and what we are learning, we're just naturally turning around and sharing with others.
For sure. Yeah, I think one of the fascinating things in that, and maybe that's another thing that I think continues to push me, is this understanding that, or you you back up, I think I had a realization at some point in the past where,
I just, realized that there's only so much that we can do, I'm gonna call it kind of at the bedside, right? And that's still the language that I use on a regular basis today. But it was the realization that if we really wanna impact the health system, and this is probably true for any industry and any business, but certainly for the health system, we have to go upstream, right? And that means thinking about health policy, that means thinking about payer policy, that means thinking about legislative,
motion and movement in our state and federal levels, which can be tough, right? It's hard because that pulls us away from the day-to-day, away from the building, away from the practice, if you will. But if we really want to create environments where our people are armed with the resources that they need, the autonomy that they need, and the ability to make the decisions that are best for the community, we have to be thinking about that. And one of the things that really came out of that realization was that that also shows up for education.
as well, right? And so that's what drove me toward the academic space is this understanding that if we want
a better healthcare system in the future. And that's a unique thing about the healthcare space, right? We all work in it today, but we're also going to be customers of it at some point too. And so it's not just a product or service that we produce for a little while and then retire and check out of. We need it. We need it to be strong and healthy, longitudinally. If that is true, which I believe it is, then we must be adamant and intentional and invested into helping the next generation of leaders prepare, accelerate,
and be prepared for the challenges that are coming their way. I think it's fascinating. I think the current generation of students gets a bad rap. think some of it is fair but 99 % of it is totally not. I think the reality is that the changes that we have seen in the healthcare space are, I'm going to argue, maybe some of my more senior colleagues would laugh and say, yeah, that's cute, Andrew, but you didn't live through that like I did. But I'm going to argue things are moving so much
faster with so much more complexity, with so much more national level connectivity, so much more alignment of incentives at national payer levels. It's not the way it was 20 years ago where you could go learn the pretty stable concepts of good accounting, good managerial theory, maybe some economics and some of the or behavioral theory type stuff, and then be prepared to go walk into what was then a relatively stable work
organization and apply those theories to help it continue to run well. I mean, at this point, feels like though we have a really exceptional educational system in our country and tremendous access to great programs, particularly in the healthcare space, it feels like today, a MHA student can get to their senior or final year of their program and already be seeing that some of the stuff that they learned in the early part of their program,
Maybe it's not gone, but it sure has seemed to have pivoted already, you know? And so good mentorship, good investment, good work on behalf of people who are practitioners, but also investing actively into helping the next generation can really just be a gasoline on the fire. It's an accelerant is what it is to help young leaders hit the ground running, be ready to step into the space actively and really pick up the baton and move it forward.
Yeah, no, I wholly agree and both in the formal academic space with when you're a practitioner, academic adjunct faculty contributor, as I know that you are, but also as you're teaching in our professional associations and societies and academies in those ways, that whole development of emerging leaders and the process or practice that I'm curious to get your perspective on as a CEO, A, you don't have heaps of extra time laying around and yet
you are contributing to both your own formation through advanced degrees and credentials, but then teaching in an academic setting. How does that teaching sharpen and sustain and advance your own leadership practice and performance?
Yeah, I think one of the neatest things that I have found is that I thought I was going into the classroom to teach.
what I found was that I was actually going into the classroom to learn. There is just as much for me to learn in that classroom as there is for me to teach. And so it is incredible. Those students may not have the years and the degrees and the alphabet soup and all that stuff that I have earned, but they certainly have innovative ways of thinking, creative abilities to see the world in a different light.
bright minds that are capable of much, that just need somebody to help them along the way. And so I have found that I feel like I get way more than I give just by getting to have proximity, to have the conversations that I get to have. being able to mentor, being able to coach, being able to help people along in the journey, they're just looking for somebody who will help them with some simple stuff is what it is. And you would be surprised that the
majority of us are out in the space, it's really not as much time as it seems like. It's certainly a heavy lift at times, but it's so worth it, right? And again, it's kind of like investing in a retirement fund, right? I mean, we can complain about what the future looks like if we want to, or we can build it and know that it's going to be better off than it could have been because we were invested in proactively helping form, grow and advance it versus just hoping for the best and checking out at the end of the day.
So I mean, I would say, know, to answer your question, it challenges me. It forces me to think differently. It pushes me to look at things from a different angle, from a different perspective. And I have not yet found a moment where that I have enough of that capability as I am constantly facing new problems or evolved versions of what was a problem that we thought we had figured out yesterday, but now it has changed a little bit more. And we've got to look for another creative solution
that does it faster at scale with less resources. So there's a lot to be had from the symbiosis of the classroom.
Absolutely. Well, and as a lifelong learner, right, it demands that you stay conversant with the most recent research and what other organizations are doing, what scholars are discerning or discovering is supported or no longer. And so that ability to force yourself to stay out in front of what's actually going on in an evidence-based reality and then being able to bring that to your teaching, not every.
Academic does that, unfortunately. But when you are, it gives you so much more insight to bring back to your organization. And I don't know if you've ever, ever gotten pushback. I'm guessing you report to a board of shareholder surgeons. And if they have ever challenged you on, Andrew, it's like you're pretty busy outside of our organization. Are you actually around and focusing? I I'm certain you're upholding and stewarding the tasks that they charge you with. But on the other hand,
I know that there is a return for your investment in how it forms you to show up and be the CEO of Ortho SC all day every day.
Yeah, and I think if I could add anything on that for my fellow leaders in that respect is that I.
I feel like I have a lot of revelations, but one of the things that I discovered on that kind of a topic is that I certainly have a great board of physicians that I work with. They've all taken care of my family at multiple times. I joke that my two boys are trying to bankrupt us on ER visits sometimes, and it feels like there's just always something going on. But they've taken great care of us. They've been incredibly flexible with us, but I had a realization several years
years ago that you know I think we are probably all a little too caught up in worrying about other folks's perception right.
Amen. Amen.
And the truth of the matter is, is I could sit and worry about perception and I could be, call it at the office every day for 12 hours a day doing it. Or I can focus on results and I can focus on building those results from wherever I need to work to produce them in whatever format that I need to do it to produce them whenever I need to do it to produce them.
Mm-hmm.
The bottom line ultimately really comes down to it's one thing to argue that you don't like the way that I produce the results but it's a very different thing to have to question whether or not I produce the results and if you're doing the production if you're delivering the results Then I would push people to think in the same way that I push students to think right It's the same stuff, but we're gonna have to use it differently apply it differently think about it differently because the world around us is moving and work is the exact same way
It is so much less about time sitting in the chair in your office now. And it is so much more about how are you going to make sure that you are prepared to show up at your best capability, with the energy that you need to have, with the clarity of mind that you need to have to serve, support, and lead your team.
And so I care way less about days in the chair and way more about optimizing to be able to serve my people and my team and to get the things done. And I think that's an interesting thing to see is our healthcare organizations, which were very traditional spaces that operated in very rigid formats for a really long time have really begun that shift now. And so they look differently, they think differently, they operate differently.
I don't think that we're going to have anybody doing remote for bedside care, although my nursing friends would all pipe up and say, well, wait a minute, what about telemonitoring and all that, which some of the innovative systems out there are using to help support their teams. And so that joke doesn't even work anymore.
But the concept is, it's not just the thinking, right? It's everything around us is going to change and we have to be thinking about how to reformat and rethink and redesign the way and the approach that we use to get to the same result, which is again, how do we take care of our community? How do we take care of our patients? How do we show up and deliver the right service at the right place at the right time to the right person every time?
Yeah. Yes. Well, and I think that that plays to two things. Importantly, it speaks to that generational dynamic that exists in our workforce and stereotypes or pre-impressions around, you know, millennials, Gen Z. So much has been said. What we're saying about Gen Z right now has been equally applied and said about millennials before them, Xers before them. And we do have to be more open-minded to realize that
There are emerging practices and technologies and processes that facilitate output in a different way than it's existed before. so humility and curiosity and open-mindedness, they're equal to what you just described in terms of your being, you know, in the office 12 hours a day, Monday through Friday. And similarly, when I think about what you've described about your leadership style, being a mentor, an educator, a developer,
You are doing that within your organization, bench strength development and succession planning. So many leaders miss the reality that almost the most substantial leverage that we have is in developing and teaching and unlocking just a little bit more capacity in every single one of our leaders, helping them to have the tools, the confidence, the clarity to be able to do what they do better.
And if you have eight direct reports or if you have 28 direct reports, if you can unlock 5 % more capacity this year in each of them, look at that leverage. so that approach is difficult for so many leaders who have this, I have to manage this, meaning I can probably just do it. And so I appreciate so many of the things that you've just been sharing for those two reasons.
Yeah, it's a unique space, right? I think...
I think it lends itself to every organization's a little different. And so you got to know the organization that you're working in. My organization has been very gracious in letting me paint with kind of an open canvas and design it the way it needs to be designed. Not every organization can or does. So context matters, right? And I've always been a leader that if I need to micromanage you, we probably won't work well together, right? I'm a long rope, not going to stand over your shoulder.
available, always happy to take a phone call, but I trust my people and I work with really smart people and so they can absolutely be trusted and they deliver and they show up and they do their thing, you know. I think one of the other things that's fascinating in that is that in the vein of what you're talking about, I think a lot of it comes down to our own need as leaders to be cognizant of the fact that we are only in our role for a time, right, and that becomes a difficult thing. guess I
Maybe I don't read as much about it now, but I feel like there was a period of time a while back where I feel like I was reading a lot in the literature about people transitioning out of roles and just having this identity crisis when they transitioned out of the role. And I don't know that I can argue I've got that figured out, certainly a in progress, but I don't know that I would argue I'm there. But it's certainly something that remains front and center for my mind is that I don't want my organization to need me for every decision. I don't want my team to need me for every decision.
I want them to have the operating intellect, the resources, the decision-making authority, that if I'm stuck in a meeting or on a plane or doing whatever I'm doing, they know what they need to accomplish, they have what they need to accomplish it, and they can move the ball down the field. And it's also important from, you again, if our goal is to serve our community well, and I get hit by a bus on the way home today, I want my team to keep on moving.
I want the practice to open tomorrow morning like nothing ever happened. And so I've built and designed and will continue to build and design systems that help that longevity and that resiliency be front and center for what we do.
I love that. Andrew, I don't think that I could close our conversation any better than that sentiment. So I just, thank you so much. I wish that we could talk for two more hours. I'm certain we could, but just thank you for joining me today for this conversation, for your generosity. And I just, continue to admire you and wish you all the best in your leadership pursuits.
It's a pleasure. Thanks so much, Laurie. It's a pleasure to be a part of it.
