Superpowers of the 40 Fast and Future Leaders of Surgical Services 2021
Whitman Partners is proud to honor and showcase the 40 Fast and Future Leaders of Surgical Services 2021. These perioperative leaders are rising through the ranks, taking on a highly challenging and gratifying job. Simply put, caring for and saving lives is a big deal.
Being real-life heroes, we asked them what they believed their superpower was.
Emina Arcan, Director of Operations/Nursing, Central Arizona Endoscopy
My superpower as a leader is my ability to relate and connect to my staff, physicians, third-party companies, and other leaders. It allows me to build relationships with them, which is very important. The close relationships that I have with my staff and physicians enable me to see what they need, and I make sure to deliver it. They know that they can come to me with anything.
I make sure to maintain a high and healthy sense of self-awareness, which allows me to look at myself and improve upon myself. But also see the need of others to empower them, believe in themselves, and know that what is inside of them is greater than any obstacle.
Christopher Hunt, Interim Director of Perioperative Services, Children’s Hospital of Colorado
I used to be an ER nurse, which has helped me to stay calm under the worst conditions possible. I can bring calmness to a room and then pull people together. It’s kind of like that coach who can get the team together, keep everybody calm and focused, and then move them into the next arena.
But I also feel like it’s only me. I build the teams, and I’m just very proud of their work. I’m not the superpowered person, but I’m like the Nick Fury of The Avengers, who kind of pulled those guys together and got them going and moving forward.
Christina Holloway, Corporate Clinical Compliance Specialist, ASC Bala Cynwyd, Pennsylvania
My ability to be flexible. I could be in Philadelphia one day and get a call, “Hey, we need you here in the morning,” and it’s on the other side of the country. And I am there.
Flexibility and adaptability are essential. I love the fact that I have suitcases in different states of unpacking just in case because I don’t know where I have to be tomorrow. But if I have to be there, people know that I will be.
Courtney Kleeb, Director of Surgical Services, Louisiana
This is from the feedback that I have gotten over the years, so I think my superpower is staying calm and focused in any situation. It’s a tense environment. There are 10,000 moving parts at any given point. There are always times when things don’t go from A to B to C. Sometimes you go from A-Z, and you have no clue how you got there. But you have to be able to take a step back and have a 30,000-foot view of what’s going on and manage that appropriately.
Dillon Hofeling, VP of Surgical Services, St. Mark’s Hospital, Utah
I believe my superpower is integrity and transparency. People can have many different ideas of how clinicians want to be spoken to, but I have always erred on the side of just being transparent with them and doing the right thing for the right reason. Now we’ve all dealt with physicians who can be gruff and want what they want when they want it, and sometimes that’s not achievable. But if they know that you’re going to work as hard as you can to uncover any possible way of getting what they want and then you still come back to them and say, “Sorry, I apologize, we can’t do this,“ they start to change their mind a little bit. They begin to kick and scream a little bit less. They still do it, but they understand that you’re working as hard as possible to help them out. So doing the right thing for the right reasons would be my superpower.
Watch the full interviews here.
Carisa Brewster
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