May 22, 2023 • 22 mins
Dr. Jennifer Schneider is co-founder and CEO of Homeward, a company focused on rearchitecting the delivery of health and care in partnership with communities everywhere, starting in rural America. Having grown up in a small town and being diagnosed with Type 1 diabetes at a young age, she experienced firsthand the challenges of accessing convenient care that millions of families across rural America deal with everyday.
Join Dr. Schneider and host Shiva Mirhosseini as they discuss developing women in leadership, opportunities for purpose-driven health organizations, and what makes Homeward different.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Shiva (00:09):
Hi. Welcome to Paving the Path. I'm your host, Shiva,
Meera Saini. People know me as a customer experience champion
and the digital executive at Fortune 50 companies. I plan
on paving the path in my show with women game changers,
thought leaders and executives touching the entire spectrum of digital
transformation in healthcare. Join me in exploring the digital renaissance
(00:33):
that's shaping healthcare today and forever changing the future of
wellness care and health. Welcome to another episode of Paving
the Path Today. My guest is Dr. Jennifer Schneider, co-founder
and CEO of Homeward, a company focused on re-architecting the
(00:56):
delivery of health and care in partnership with communities everywhere,
starting in rural America. Having grown up in a small
town and being diagnosed with Type one diabetes at a
young age, she experienced firsthand the challenges of accessing convenient
care that millions of families across rural America deal with
(01:17):
every day. This fueled her passion to found Homeworld and
create novel, value based care models that are purpose built
to address the needs of rural Americans. Previously, Dr. Schneider
served as the chief medical officer and president of Livongo.
While there, she led the company through the largest consumer
(01:38):
digital health initial public offering in history and the industry's
largest merger ever between Livongo and Teladoc Health, valuing Livongo
at $18.5 billion. She also served as the chief medical
officer of Catholic Health. Dr. Schneider has been honored by
(01:58):
modern healthcare as one of the 100 most influential people
in health care and by fierce healthcare as a woman
of influence for her work. Empowering women and modeling diversity
and inclusion in the workforce. Dr. Schneider is also on
the board of City Block, Maven and Jasper. Dr. Schneider,
(02:21):
on behalf of all of our listeners, myself and the team,
it's an absolute honor to have you on the show.
Thank you so much for making time for us.
Jennifer (02:29):
Thank you so much for the opportunity to be here today.
Shiva (02:32):
Thank you. Well, let's get to it. Can you share
a little bit about your background and how you got
to healthcare in general and in these leadership roles?
Jennifer (02:42):
Sure. So my background is I was born into a
large family in the Midwest. I was diagnosed when I
was 12 years old with Type one diabetes. No one
in my family was in health care at that time,
but that really spurred my own interest. And so I
decided to go to medical school and became an internal
(03:03):
medicine doc. I went to Johns Hopkins for medical school,
and then I transitioned. I did my residency at Stanford,
and it was when I was at Stanford that I
got to meet and hear a lot of different cross-pollination ideas.
And so one of the things that really struck me
early on was how can we make a big difference
at scale and how do we do that within the
(03:26):
walls of health care, the existing health care system and beyond.
So I was fortunate to have many opportunities and get
to work with incredible leaders and learn beside them on
this on my journey.
Shiva (03:38):
That's amazing. And you have led two digital health companies
in Livongo and Homework that address challenges that you have
personally experienced, as you mentioned, in your life. What is
the impact of a mission driven health care organization?
Jennifer (03:52):
When you find what it is you're passionate about? If
you pursue your passion, you're going to accomplish incredible things.
And that's especially true in health care, where there are
so many areas up and ripe for improvement. And really
the ability to go in there and identify with what
it is individually that excites each of us will really
(04:13):
allow us to pursue that with the extra passion that
it takes, particularly when you're founding something new.
Shiva (04:18):
So with that said, and given Homewards mission, can you
kind of give us the layperson's explanation of what the
company does and why is it different?
Jennifer (04:28):
Sure. Absolutely. So Homer and I was able to found
Homeward with my co-founder and business partner, Mark Hendel, and
the mission of Homeward is to re-architect the delivery of
health care in rural America. And what that means is,
you know, we took a look around us and said,
what is really broken in the health care ecosystem that
needs some fixing? And we settled in rural markets, which
(04:50):
with with a surprising statistic, which is that if you
live in a zip code that's designated as rural, your
mortality is 23% higher than if you live in an
urban area. And so we asked ourselves a question could
we change this? Is there something that we know or
we could do that. Uniquely different to change the outcome here.
(05:11):
And we really settled on the Company of Homeward with
two key concepts. One is we need to build on
a very foundational technology stack so that we could scale
services to meet demands, because service providers, the lack of
service providers is pervasive in rural America. And that's a
big reason as to why the mortality is so high.
(05:31):
And the second was, in order to deliver these novel
types of care, we really needed to make ourselves financially
accountable for the whole care of the individual person, something
called total global capitation or value based care, so that
we could deliver the in-home services, the remote patient monitoring
the telehealth services and frankly, the optimal combination to each
(05:54):
individual to help them achieve their their most healthy, successful
state that they could get to.
Shiva (05:59):
That's incredible. Can you kind of walk us through perhaps
given the complexity of healthcare in general and then bringing
care to rural areas with the tech stack with a
more modern approach? What are some of the more surprising
nuances that you have come to learn in your journey
(06:20):
right now? And when it comes to kind of bringing that,
for lack of a better word, better experience, especially to
rural Americans, what do you think we can reasonably expect?
Jennifer (06:33):
Health care is ultimately a game about trust and personal interactions.
So that means we have to build things that people
want to use in a way that they want to
use it by listening to what they're telling us. And
I think that that that fundamental principle underscores any successful
component in health care writ large technology, The advent of
(06:56):
the technology advances that we've made over the last few decades,
what that has done is really allow us to get
faster at our understanding and our learning of what people
want and be able to iterate on what we there for,
deliver to them the words that we use, the messages
that resonate with what their personal goals are relative to
(07:16):
their health. And so I think that this ability to
leverage and use the technology components is the key answer.
So let me give you an example. So at Homeward,
you know, we start with our members with a home visit.
We go into their homes, we visit with a member,
we establish health goals. But by being in somebody's house,
it really allows us to have a personal connection and
(07:39):
build trust in a way that then allows us to
deploy telehealth, remote patient monitoring that people use ongoing in
a regular basis. Because we've already established ourselves as a
trusted entity with alignment of goals for the individual and
for what we're trying to accomplish.
Shiva (07:56):
Wow. I did not know that. That's pretty profound to
have that kind of in-person intake and have a kind
of a 360 view of the patient, essentially. Right? Because
as you mentioned, those kind of social determinants of health
or kind of your zip code, there are a lot
of non clinical issues around that health that can drive
(08:19):
our behavior and our actions. And a lot of that
can be picked up as you actually interact with the patients.
And so I think that really paves a path for
a very different experience for those consumers that engage with homework.
I want to switch to the women in leadership, but
before I do that, just to build on what you
(08:41):
mentioned with respect to building trust and kind of what
is called a trust economy more generally speaking, and now
bringing that really to to health care, what kind of
progress do you think we can realistically expect in health care,
given the fast changing technology in the next couple of years?
Jennifer (09:01):
I would start in an area where if you take
a look at what we have highly, highly trained physicians
do on a regular basis, about a third of their
time is chart entry, very, very clerical scribing components to it.
And yet we asked somebody to go to college for
four years to go to medical school for four years
(09:22):
and then do a residency, the shortest of which is
three years, right? And then they come out and we
ask them to type in a bunch of forms and
fill out letters. And so the reason I start there
is that there is a whole world in which we
can make the medical care ecosystem more efficient. What that
does is it allows our shortage of providers to really
(09:43):
do the things that we're training them for, the thinking,
the complex diagnoses, right, and takes away a lot of
the lower level tasks. So I think that there is
a huge advancement in technology for efficiency gain in kind
of like the back end of the office, if you will.
But even more exciting to me is, you know, as
you're looking at and and the cusp of looking at
(10:05):
a number of large language models and AI and. Into
health care is this ability to actually make health care
more affordable. So an example is, you know, if it's
true that somebody with depression benefits from talking with another
human being every day, let's say, let's state that is
a truth. We don't have to argue as to whether
(10:25):
or not that is true. But if that's true, and
we know that, but we say, you know what, it's
really expensive to have a individual patient talk to a
therapist for an hour every day. And by the way,
there's not enough therapist to be able to do that,
to scale that. What if you could change that model
and you could have a check in or a call
or something that's more automated so that the cost of
(10:48):
the interaction, an exchange of data decreases and drops to,
you know, $0.10 an hour, for example, does that then
then increases the ability to deliver health care and drive
outcomes at scale, then actually, you know, make optimal health
care and optimal outcomes more affordable for everybody. And I
think that is the promise of technology, is that technology
(11:10):
can be an absolute enabler for us as we cross
the chasm in allowing health equity and better outcomes.
Shiva (11:17):
I love that. I love how you structure it as technology,
really bringing the best out of what the ecosystem, the
health care system can offer and all those wonderful exchanges
and personal touches that we currently are missing because we
have a burnout problem in this country and not enough
(11:40):
resources really to be dedicated to all sorts of different
not just diseases, chronic issues, but especially, as you mentioned,
on the mental health side, which is becoming very quickly,
some people say another pandemic or epidemic at least. So, Jenny,
given your leadership roles in some of the most sought
(12:03):
after and highly successful technology enabled healthcare companies, as a
woman leader, as a prominent female figure, what is your
advice to the new generation of women leaders that are
coming to this space? I You have been an amazing
sounding board and advisor to companies like Maven, like City
(12:28):
Block with Kate Ryder of Maven and Toyin of City Block.
You're on the board of many, many companies throughout your career, Jenny.
You have been committed to empowering fellow women leaders and
launched a women in leadership program at Livongo that was
resoundingly successful. Since that time, many of those women have
(12:49):
gone on to take prominent leadership roles across the digital
health industry. What did your Women in Leadership program in
Focus on, and why do you think that so many
women from Livongo have gone on to have continued success?
Jennifer (13:03):
Great questions. Maybe I'll start with the first one. So
when we were at when I was at Livongo, we
were able and fortunate to have a board and a
leadership team that backed my and a couple of other
people's interest in focusing on women leaders are women in
leadership program really had two parts to it. One was
external recognition and awards, and the other one was internal
(13:26):
development and skill sets for the people that applied and
were selected to be in the women in leadership. And
those people that applied and were selected were at all
various parts of their career journey within Livongo. But it
was a commitment that they made to be to attend
a session once a month and sort of pay it forward,
if you will. I think the success there was the
(13:49):
combination of the commitment to help one another to become
better and stronger leaders and to talk about real industry insights.
We certainly talked about work life balance, but a lot
of what we talked about were very hard core skill sets.
How do you negotiate for a raise? How do you
negotiate a higher salary? So the parts of you know,
(14:12):
when you compare women and men in the disparity as
to where they stand in leadership positions, a lot of
that can be trained and taught and inculcated. So that
was what we focused on when we were on the
internal part of where the women in leadership at Livongo.
Why is it that so many people from Livongo have
taken strong leadership positions? I would say first and foremost,
we were very fortunate to get incredible talent brought into Livongo.
(14:37):
We were created a culture that really focused on supporting
strength of diversity and really allowed people to bring their
whole selves. And that includes includes being a woman, people
with women, men have different needs or different lifestyles. But
beyond that, beyond gender, we did that as well. And
so I think people coming out of Livongo had an
(14:59):
experienced an incredible work environment, and we're with an investment
for them to be able to accomplish what whatever it
was that they wanted to accomplish.
Shiva (15:07):
There is a lot of great nuggets there. One that
really resonates with me is the power of sponsorship for
women at different levels of their career. What traits do
you do? You see the most successful leaders that you
have worked with have in common?
Jennifer (15:25):
I feel very fortunate to be able to work alongside
Toyin and Kate and have learned a tremendous amount from
both of them. And they are. They stand alone and
all they have accomplished by themselves. They have done that
with their teams and deserve all the credit. I recently
shared this with someone else that those two in particular
are some of the strongest founding female CEOs that I've
(15:47):
ever met, and they actually share a unique characteristic. They're
very different personalities, but they share a unique characteristic, and
that is this idea to radically listen, to put themselves
in a position to even when they're the smartest person
in a topic, they're not expounding. They're actually asking questions
to gather more information and the insights that they glean
(16:09):
and the power that's the power as to how they
use that and how they lead is really remarkable. And
so when I look around male and female leaders, the
people that are curious and who are listen by asking
questions that they want to have answer, they really are curious.
We want to hear the answer. Are they leaders that
I find to be the most effective?
Shiva (16:30):
Thanks for that. That's super helpful. And I think all
of us can practice that at least. You know, we
may not be born with that inquisitiveness, but we can
certainly practice. One astonishing statistic is that despite the fact
that women make 80% of healthcare decisions, they only make
up 13% of CEOs and 30% of C-suite teams. When
(16:53):
speaking with other leaders across healthcare. How do you advocate
for improved gender diversity amongst leadership teams especially?
Jennifer (17:02):
I think it starts with recognition around the people that
you're servicing, right? So can we talk about this a lot?
It's really hard to understand the people for whom you're
building a service if you don't have that voice at
the table, That voice at the table really matters. But
I think it's more than just hitting, you know, like
signing up for a quota and kind of hitting the
percent of people there. More important than that is the
(17:26):
ability to have the power of the voice. So our
women allowed at the table and when they're at the table,
does their voice reverberate as strongly as men? And I
think that there is a growing understanding, particularly in health care,
because of the statistics that you just quoted, that you
won't be successful unless you have those voices at the
(17:46):
table helping you and your company make decisions.
Shiva (17:49):
So part of that, if I'm hearing this correctly, is
the individuals, the leaders leaning in. But also, you know,
it takes two to tango. There has to be a
receiving hand on the other end, which goes back to
that power of sponsorship. Did I catch that correctly?
Jennifer (18:06):
That's right. I think mentorship and sponsorship go a long
way for any minority that's not represented to to equal components,
and that's particularly true for women.
Shiva (18:17):
Absolutely. We covered quite a bit with respect to kind
of some of the underlying shifts in the industry, what
Homeward is doing in rural America and also some of
the headwinds when it comes to diversity, inclusion. And your advice, Jennie,
where would you say you're excited about in the next
(18:38):
kind of 6 to 12 months with respect to home
word and probably more broadly with respect to healthcare in general?
Jennifer (18:46):
First and foremost, I am so happy with the team
that we've been able to assemble at Homeward, both culturally
and talent wise. I am very honored to be partnered
with our two partners, Priority Health and Blue Cross Blue
Shield of Minnesota. And between the team and our partnership,
we will be focused on delivering excellent care to everybody
(19:08):
we can touch. In rural Michigan and rural Minnesota. So
for the next 6 to 12 months, that's what that's
absolutely what will be. But we'll be heads down and
focusing on.
Shiva (19:18):
That's fabulous. I'm sure we'll be hearing great, great news
and many more milestones from the team. Is there any
advice or thoughts that you want to leave with our
audience with respect to some of the trends that you're
seeing in general and or just more broadly around health
care and what to look out for?
Jennifer (19:39):
I think we're at a crossroads now in health care,
where technology and technology enabled services will allow and have
and will continue to fast forward us in our ability
to make a dent in health equity. The goal of
technology has always been how can we reach more people
at a lower cost and improve health outcomes across the
(20:01):
entire population, not just the worried well or the slightly sick,
wealthy people? And. I think we're at a crossroads, both
from a scale of technology and from an interest in
the population that we are truly going to make a
difference in health equity in the next in the next
short time period. And it's an exciting time to be
in health care, particularly when you care about delivering high
(20:23):
quality health care to as many people as possible.
Shiva (20:26):
I love that sound of optimism. Jenny and I share
that wholeheartedly with you, and I know our listeners do
as well. Speaking of our listeners, if they want to
follow you, find you follow your thought leadership, where would
you direct them?
Jennifer (20:42):
So I would go to Homeward Health and go to
our website and follow Homeward Health on LinkedIn and Twitter
or follow me in LinkedIn and Twitter.
Shiva (20:50):
Fabulous. Well, thank you so much for spending some time
with us today. I really enjoyed this conversation, learned a
great deal. And I'll be I've already been following homeward,
but I will be following your thought leadership even more closely.
And those female leaders that you mentioned earlier, it's been
(21:13):
a fabulous conversation. Jenny. Thank you so much again. And
thank you so much to our listeners for joining us today.
Jennifer (21:21):
Thank you. Thank you for the time and the opportunity
to have a discussion.
Jared (21:26):
Thanks for tuning in. If you like what you heard,
please spread the word. Tell your colleagues to tune in
for all the awesomeness, then leave a review on Apple,
Spotify or wherever you listen. This show is produced by
Shift Forward Health The Channel for Change Makers. Subscribe to
Shift Forward Health on your favorite podcast app and you'll
be subscribed to our entire library of shows. See our
full lineup at Shift Forward Health one subscription all the
(21:48):
podcasts you need and it's all for free. And remember,
we might have a lot of work to do in
health care, but we'll get there faster together. Thanks again.
Hi. Welcome to Paving the Path. I'm your host, Shiva,
Meera Saini. People know me as a customer experience champion
and the digital executive at Fortune 50 companies. I plan
on paving the path in my show with women game changers,
thought leaders and executives touching the entire spectrum of digital
transformation in healthcare. Join me in exploring the digital renaissance
(00:33):
that's shaping healthcare today and forever changing the future of
wellness care and health. Welcome to another episode of Paving
the Path Today. My guest is Dr. Jennifer Schneider, co-founder
and CEO of Homeward, a company focused on re-architecting the
(00:56):
delivery of health and care in partnership with communities everywhere,
starting in rural America. Having grown up in a small
town and being diagnosed with Type one diabetes at a
young age, she experienced firsthand the challenges of accessing convenient
care that millions of families across rural America deal with
(01:17):
every day. This fueled her passion to found Homeworld and
create novel, value based care models that are purpose built
to address the needs of rural Americans. Previously, Dr. Schneider
served as the chief medical officer and president of Livongo.
While there, she led the company through the largest consumer
(01:38):
digital health initial public offering in history and the industry's
largest merger ever between Livongo and Teladoc Health, valuing Livongo
at $18.5 billion. She also served as the chief medical
officer of Catholic Health. Dr. Schneider has been honored by
(01:58):
modern healthcare as one of the 100 most influential people
in health care and by fierce healthcare as a woman
of influence for her work. Empowering women and modeling diversity
and inclusion in the workforce. Dr. Schneider is also on
the board of City Block, Maven and Jasper. Dr. Schneider,
(02:21):
on behalf of all of our listeners, myself and the team,
it's an absolute honor to have you on the show.
Thank you so much for making time for us.
Jennifer (02:29):
Thank you so much for the opportunity to be here today.
Shiva (02:32):
Thank you. Well, let's get to it. Can you share
a little bit about your background and how you got
to healthcare in general and in these leadership roles?
Jennifer (02:42):
Sure. So my background is I was born into a
large family in the Midwest. I was diagnosed when I
was 12 years old with Type one diabetes. No one
in my family was in health care at that time,
but that really spurred my own interest. And so I
decided to go to medical school and became an internal
(03:03):
medicine doc. I went to Johns Hopkins for medical school,
and then I transitioned. I did my residency at Stanford,
and it was when I was at Stanford that I
got to meet and hear a lot of different cross-pollination ideas.
And so one of the things that really struck me
early on was how can we make a big difference
at scale and how do we do that within the
(03:26):
walls of health care, the existing health care system and beyond.
So I was fortunate to have many opportunities and get
to work with incredible leaders and learn beside them on
this on my journey.
Shiva (03:38):
That's amazing. And you have led two digital health companies
in Livongo and Homework that address challenges that you have
personally experienced, as you mentioned, in your life. What is
the impact of a mission driven health care organization?
Jennifer (03:52):
When you find what it is you're passionate about? If
you pursue your passion, you're going to accomplish incredible things.
And that's especially true in health care, where there are
so many areas up and ripe for improvement. And really
the ability to go in there and identify with what
it is individually that excites each of us will really
(04:13):
allow us to pursue that with the extra passion that
it takes, particularly when you're founding something new.
Shiva (04:18):
So with that said, and given Homewards mission, can you
kind of give us the layperson's explanation of what the
company does and why is it different?
Jennifer (04:28):
Sure. Absolutely. So Homer and I was able to found
Homeward with my co-founder and business partner, Mark Hendel, and
the mission of Homeward is to re-architect the delivery of
health care in rural America. And what that means is,
you know, we took a look around us and said,
what is really broken in the health care ecosystem that
needs some fixing? And we settled in rural markets, which
(04:50):
with with a surprising statistic, which is that if you
live in a zip code that's designated as rural, your
mortality is 23% higher than if you live in an
urban area. And so we asked ourselves a question could
we change this? Is there something that we know or
we could do that. Uniquely different to change the outcome here.
(05:11):
And we really settled on the Company of Homeward with
two key concepts. One is we need to build on
a very foundational technology stack so that we could scale
services to meet demands, because service providers, the lack of
service providers is pervasive in rural America. And that's a
big reason as to why the mortality is so high.
(05:31):
And the second was, in order to deliver these novel
types of care, we really needed to make ourselves financially
accountable for the whole care of the individual person, something
called total global capitation or value based care, so that
we could deliver the in-home services, the remote patient monitoring
the telehealth services and frankly, the optimal combination to each
(05:54):
individual to help them achieve their their most healthy, successful
state that they could get to.
Shiva (05:59):
That's incredible. Can you kind of walk us through perhaps
given the complexity of healthcare in general and then bringing
care to rural areas with the tech stack with a
more modern approach? What are some of the more surprising
nuances that you have come to learn in your journey
(06:20):
right now? And when it comes to kind of bringing that,
for lack of a better word, better experience, especially to
rural Americans, what do you think we can reasonably expect?
Jennifer (06:33):
Health care is ultimately a game about trust and personal interactions.
So that means we have to build things that people
want to use in a way that they want to
use it by listening to what they're telling us. And
I think that that that fundamental principle underscores any successful
component in health care writ large technology, The advent of
(06:56):
the technology advances that we've made over the last few decades,
what that has done is really allow us to get
faster at our understanding and our learning of what people
want and be able to iterate on what we there for,
deliver to them the words that we use, the messages
that resonate with what their personal goals are relative to
(07:16):
their health. And so I think that this ability to
leverage and use the technology components is the key answer.
So let me give you an example. So at Homeward,
you know, we start with our members with a home visit.
We go into their homes, we visit with a member,
we establish health goals. But by being in somebody's house,
it really allows us to have a personal connection and
(07:39):
build trust in a way that then allows us to
deploy telehealth, remote patient monitoring that people use ongoing in
a regular basis. Because we've already established ourselves as a
trusted entity with alignment of goals for the individual and
for what we're trying to accomplish.
Shiva (07:56):
Wow. I did not know that. That's pretty profound to
have that kind of in-person intake and have a kind
of a 360 view of the patient, essentially. Right? Because
as you mentioned, those kind of social determinants of health
or kind of your zip code, there are a lot
of non clinical issues around that health that can drive
(08:19):
our behavior and our actions. And a lot of that
can be picked up as you actually interact with the patients.
And so I think that really paves a path for
a very different experience for those consumers that engage with homework.
I want to switch to the women in leadership, but
before I do that, just to build on what you
(08:41):
mentioned with respect to building trust and kind of what
is called a trust economy more generally speaking, and now
bringing that really to to health care, what kind of
progress do you think we can realistically expect in health care,
given the fast changing technology in the next couple of years?
Jennifer (09:01):
I would start in an area where if you take
a look at what we have highly, highly trained physicians
do on a regular basis, about a third of their
time is chart entry, very, very clerical scribing components to it.
And yet we asked somebody to go to college for
four years to go to medical school for four years
(09:22):
and then do a residency, the shortest of which is
three years, right? And then they come out and we
ask them to type in a bunch of forms and
fill out letters. And so the reason I start there
is that there is a whole world in which we
can make the medical care ecosystem more efficient. What that
does is it allows our shortage of providers to really
(09:43):
do the things that we're training them for, the thinking,
the complex diagnoses, right, and takes away a lot of
the lower level tasks. So I think that there is
a huge advancement in technology for efficiency gain in kind
of like the back end of the office, if you will.
But even more exciting to me is, you know, as
you're looking at and and the cusp of looking at
(10:05):
a number of large language models and AI and. Into
health care is this ability to actually make health care
more affordable. So an example is, you know, if it's
true that somebody with depression benefits from talking with another
human being every day, let's say, let's state that is
a truth. We don't have to argue as to whether
(10:25):
or not that is true. But if that's true, and
we know that, but we say, you know what, it's
really expensive to have a individual patient talk to a
therapist for an hour every day. And by the way,
there's not enough therapist to be able to do that,
to scale that. What if you could change that model
and you could have a check in or a call
or something that's more automated so that the cost of
(10:48):
the interaction, an exchange of data decreases and drops to,
you know, $0.10 an hour, for example, does that then
then increases the ability to deliver health care and drive
outcomes at scale, then actually, you know, make optimal health
care and optimal outcomes more affordable for everybody. And I
think that is the promise of technology, is that technology
(11:10):
can be an absolute enabler for us as we cross
the chasm in allowing health equity and better outcomes.
Shiva (11:17):
I love that. I love how you structure it as technology,
really bringing the best out of what the ecosystem, the
health care system can offer and all those wonderful exchanges
and personal touches that we currently are missing because we
have a burnout problem in this country and not enough
(11:40):
resources really to be dedicated to all sorts of different
not just diseases, chronic issues, but especially, as you mentioned,
on the mental health side, which is becoming very quickly,
some people say another pandemic or epidemic at least. So, Jenny,
given your leadership roles in some of the most sought
(12:03):
after and highly successful technology enabled healthcare companies, as a
woman leader, as a prominent female figure, what is your
advice to the new generation of women leaders that are
coming to this space? I You have been an amazing
sounding board and advisor to companies like Maven, like City
(12:28):
Block with Kate Ryder of Maven and Toyin of City Block.
You're on the board of many, many companies throughout your career, Jenny.
You have been committed to empowering fellow women leaders and
launched a women in leadership program at Livongo that was
resoundingly successful. Since that time, many of those women have
(12:49):
gone on to take prominent leadership roles across the digital
health industry. What did your Women in Leadership program in
Focus on, and why do you think that so many
women from Livongo have gone on to have continued success?
Jennifer (13:03):
Great questions. Maybe I'll start with the first one. So
when we were at when I was at Livongo, we
were able and fortunate to have a board and a
leadership team that backed my and a couple of other
people's interest in focusing on women leaders are women in
leadership program really had two parts to it. One was
external recognition and awards, and the other one was internal
(13:26):
development and skill sets for the people that applied and
were selected to be in the women in leadership. And
those people that applied and were selected were at all
various parts of their career journey within Livongo. But it
was a commitment that they made to be to attend
a session once a month and sort of pay it forward,
if you will. I think the success there was the
(13:49):
combination of the commitment to help one another to become
better and stronger leaders and to talk about real industry insights.
We certainly talked about work life balance, but a lot
of what we talked about were very hard core skill sets.
How do you negotiate for a raise? How do you
negotiate a higher salary? So the parts of you know,
(14:12):
when you compare women and men in the disparity as
to where they stand in leadership positions, a lot of
that can be trained and taught and inculcated. So that
was what we focused on when we were on the
internal part of where the women in leadership at Livongo.
Why is it that so many people from Livongo have
taken strong leadership positions? I would say first and foremost,
we were very fortunate to get incredible talent brought into Livongo.
(14:37):
We were created a culture that really focused on supporting
strength of diversity and really allowed people to bring their
whole selves. And that includes includes being a woman, people
with women, men have different needs or different lifestyles. But
beyond that, beyond gender, we did that as well. And
so I think people coming out of Livongo had an
(14:59):
experienced an incredible work environment, and we're with an investment
for them to be able to accomplish what whatever it
was that they wanted to accomplish.
Shiva (15:07):
There is a lot of great nuggets there. One that
really resonates with me is the power of sponsorship for
women at different levels of their career. What traits do
you do? You see the most successful leaders that you
have worked with have in common?
Jennifer (15:25):
I feel very fortunate to be able to work alongside
Toyin and Kate and have learned a tremendous amount from
both of them. And they are. They stand alone and
all they have accomplished by themselves. They have done that
with their teams and deserve all the credit. I recently
shared this with someone else that those two in particular
are some of the strongest founding female CEOs that I've
(15:47):
ever met, and they actually share a unique characteristic. They're
very different personalities, but they share a unique characteristic, and
that is this idea to radically listen, to put themselves
in a position to even when they're the smartest person
in a topic, they're not expounding. They're actually asking questions
to gather more information and the insights that they glean
(16:09):
and the power that's the power as to how they
use that and how they lead is really remarkable. And
so when I look around male and female leaders, the
people that are curious and who are listen by asking
questions that they want to have answer, they really are curious.
We want to hear the answer. Are they leaders that
I find to be the most effective?
Shiva (16:30):
Thanks for that. That's super helpful. And I think all
of us can practice that at least. You know, we
may not be born with that inquisitiveness, but we can
certainly practice. One astonishing statistic is that despite the fact
that women make 80% of healthcare decisions, they only make
up 13% of CEOs and 30% of C-suite teams. When
(16:53):
speaking with other leaders across healthcare. How do you advocate
for improved gender diversity amongst leadership teams especially?
Jennifer (17:02):
I think it starts with recognition around the people that
you're servicing, right? So can we talk about this a lot?
It's really hard to understand the people for whom you're
building a service if you don't have that voice at
the table, That voice at the table really matters. But
I think it's more than just hitting, you know, like
signing up for a quota and kind of hitting the
percent of people there. More important than that is the
(17:26):
ability to have the power of the voice. So our
women allowed at the table and when they're at the table,
does their voice reverberate as strongly as men? And I
think that there is a growing understanding, particularly in health care,
because of the statistics that you just quoted, that you
won't be successful unless you have those voices at the
(17:46):
table helping you and your company make decisions.
Shiva (17:49):
So part of that, if I'm hearing this correctly, is
the individuals, the leaders leaning in. But also, you know,
it takes two to tango. There has to be a
receiving hand on the other end, which goes back to
that power of sponsorship. Did I catch that correctly?
Jennifer (18:06):
That's right. I think mentorship and sponsorship go a long
way for any minority that's not represented to to equal components,
and that's particularly true for women.
Shiva (18:17):
Absolutely. We covered quite a bit with respect to kind
of some of the underlying shifts in the industry, what
Homeward is doing in rural America and also some of
the headwinds when it comes to diversity, inclusion. And your advice, Jennie,
where would you say you're excited about in the next
(18:38):
kind of 6 to 12 months with respect to home
word and probably more broadly with respect to healthcare in general?
Jennifer (18:46):
First and foremost, I am so happy with the team
that we've been able to assemble at Homeward, both culturally
and talent wise. I am very honored to be partnered
with our two partners, Priority Health and Blue Cross Blue
Shield of Minnesota. And between the team and our partnership,
we will be focused on delivering excellent care to everybody
(19:08):
we can touch. In rural Michigan and rural Minnesota. So
for the next 6 to 12 months, that's what that's
absolutely what will be. But we'll be heads down and
focusing on.
Shiva (19:18):
That's fabulous. I'm sure we'll be hearing great, great news
and many more milestones from the team. Is there any
advice or thoughts that you want to leave with our
audience with respect to some of the trends that you're
seeing in general and or just more broadly around health
care and what to look out for?
Jennifer (19:39):
I think we're at a crossroads now in health care,
where technology and technology enabled services will allow and have
and will continue to fast forward us in our ability
to make a dent in health equity. The goal of
technology has always been how can we reach more people
at a lower cost and improve health outcomes across the
(20:01):
entire population, not just the worried well or the slightly sick,
wealthy people? And. I think we're at a crossroads, both
from a scale of technology and from an interest in
the population that we are truly going to make a
difference in health equity in the next in the next
short time period. And it's an exciting time to be
in health care, particularly when you care about delivering high
(20:23):
quality health care to as many people as possible.
Shiva (20:26):
I love that sound of optimism. Jenny and I share
that wholeheartedly with you, and I know our listeners do
as well. Speaking of our listeners, if they want to
follow you, find you follow your thought leadership, where would
you direct them?
Jennifer (20:42):
So I would go to Homeward Health and go to
our website and follow Homeward Health on LinkedIn and Twitter
or follow me in LinkedIn and Twitter.
Shiva (20:50):
Fabulous. Well, thank you so much for spending some time
with us today. I really enjoyed this conversation, learned a
great deal. And I'll be I've already been following homeward,
but I will be following your thought leadership even more closely.
And those female leaders that you mentioned earlier, it's been
(21:13):
a fabulous conversation. Jenny. Thank you so much again. And
thank you so much to our listeners for joining us today.
Jennifer (21:21):
Thank you. Thank you for the time and the opportunity
to have a discussion.
Jared (21:26):
Thanks for tuning in. If you like what you heard,
please spread the word. Tell your colleagues to tune in
for all the awesomeness, then leave a review on Apple,
Spotify or wherever you listen. This show is produced by
Shift Forward Health The Channel for Change Makers. Subscribe to
Shift Forward Health on your favorite podcast app and you'll
be subscribed to our entire library of shows. See our
full lineup at Shift Forward Health one subscription all the
(21:48):
podcasts you need and it's all for free. And remember,
we might have a lot of work to do in
health care, but we'll get there faster together. Thanks again.
Popular Podcasts
United States of Kennedy
United States of Kennedy is a podcast about our cultural fascination with the Kennedy dynasty. Every week, hosts Lyra Smith and George Civeris go into one aspect of the Kennedy story.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.