Your First 90 Days:
How New Healthcare Leaders Build Trust Before Making Changes

Transforming Healthcare Coaching Podcast — Episode 101: Your First 90 Days — Neill Marshall & Kurt Mosley on Healthcare Leadership. A LinkedIn Live event. Host: Lillian Liang Emlet, MD MS CHSE CPC ELI-MP. Guests: Neill Marshall, Chairman, and Kurt Mosley, Association Practice Leader, HealthSearch Partners. Published March 23, 2026.

Kurt Mosley: It's hard to talk your way out of something you behaved yourself into. In that first 90 days that's something our leaders, I think need to hear because people don't really care about the memos you write or the things that you post, or the sign board you put up at the hospital. They see what your behavior is. You're on stage as a leader and every day you're being evaluated.

Neill Marshall: The appearance was important and that we were going to be focusing on the small things. So I may be putting you on the spot, but as a physician

Kurt Mosley: mm-hmm.

Neill Marshall: what are symbolic things that you do, whether it's with patients or peers or whoever. What are things that physicians do that can be kind of considered a symbolic act?

Lillian Liang Emlet: Hello from Transforming Healthcare Coaching. My name is Lillian Liang Emlet. I am the Founder of Transforming Healthcare Coaching, and we are super excited for today's event, which is all about leadership and the first 90 days. And joining us is Neill Marshall and Kurt Mosley from Health Search Partners. And I'll let both, Kurt and Neill introduce themselves.

Kurt Mosley: Sure. thanks for having us today, Lillian. My name is Kurt Mosley. I'm the Association Practice Leader with Health Search Partners. And what that means is I help the association, the healthcare Association throughout America find leaders, both on the hospital side and the physician side, and I develop relationships with those state associations that endorse our products and create those relationships, and a nationally known speaker and my role is thought leadership with our company and getting our message out to the public. And again, thanks for having us.

Neill Marshall: And hi, Lillian. I'm Neill Marshall. I'm the Chairman of Health Search Partners. Have been in executive search. Specifically in the hospital and healthcare industry for almost 30 years. And I helped lead the organization and then, helped lead executive searches, inside hospitals, across the country and along with Kurt, I'm also the architect of our first 90 day series.

Lillian Liang Emlet: Awesome. So thank you both so much for being here because I think this is a topic that most of our audience, people who are just aspiring leaders are very interested in. So you have interviewed thousands of healthcare executives across their career span, and so what made you zero in specifically on the first 90 days?

Neill Marshall: so the idea for the series came out of a conversation that Kurt and I were having with a hospital CEO, by the name of Richard Parks. We were interviewing him about something else, and he said that whenever he takes a new CEO position, he literally moves into the hospital for the first 90 days. The family stays back, they sell the house, then they move, and he literally moves in, so that he can really, understand the organization from the inside out. And I'm going to tell you that caught our attention. I've interviewed 10,000 hospital executives and nobody had ever described something that deliberate. And that made me realize that, "Hey, the first 90 days may be different than every other part of leadership." it's the moment when a leader decides who they're going to be, in the eyes of organization, not in theory, but invisible behavior. so Kurt and I started interviewing executives specifically about what they actually did during that 90 day period. Not strategy, not big picture, but visible behaviors, that they did. and we started hearing some fascinating stories. We, wrote articles about them and have decided that it's a real important thing. And so we kept focusing on it because we want leaders to be intentional about their first 90 days, decide the tone that they're going to set, what symbolic actions you're going to take, what are the relationships that you're going to focus on, and the wins that you're going to try and get.

Lillian Liang Emlet: It's such a great point because I think with many of our clients. They don't find us before they take on the position. as coaches, they find once they're somewhere in the sticky middle, like, well beyond the first 90 days. And then they're like,

Neill Marshall: why? Once they shoved their toes. Right,

Lillian Liang Emlet: right, right. And, but I have to admit, like there are some people who are being more, more proactive because some of the advice that mentorship that has been had in the leadership circles have started to tell people: "you need to put this into your contract. You need to put this into your negotiation package." And so it's really great for people who are listening that you need to think about this no matter where you are, no matter what inflection point you are a, just beginning your career into your very first position, mid-career or even senior career, which is obviously your expertise, with your organization, your company, to do the right matching and the right fit for mission and values of the organization and the personal and the opportunities that lie therein. But every single one of those inflection points does require a negotiation of what supports are you going to get along the way. And so, I'm curious, many healthcare leaders step into these roles and they're already under pressure, like right from the get go. The boards is pressuring them because there are things they want to have fixed in the organization. the teams that report, the teams that they're inheriting from others, and sometimes there's good culture and there's really healthy things that are already in place, and other places there are things that are unhealthy. What are the most common mistakes that you see leaders make whenever the pressure really hits in those first few weeks?

Neill Marshall: I think probably focusing on fixing problems, fixing strategy. I mean, looking at situations maybe that have been broken for 10 years and trying to focus on those versus, really sitting back focusing on tone, building trust. looking at symbolic acts that they can do, and making these huge changes instead of really focusing on tone, symbolism, and trust.

Lillian Liang Emlet: Yeah, I love that. Neill and Kurt. Well, I'm going to say, Kurt, what do you think?

Kurt Mosley: Well, I think. Most importantly, we'll probably get into culture later too, but culture really matters at the start. I mean, we look at the successful leaders that we interview. Don't rush to change the culture in the first 90 days. They take time to understand it first. and that's an important part, I think, because again, culture sets the stage for how people interpret your adaptation to the job that you understand who you're talking to. And they don't rush to judgment. they take time to listen first. they listen more than they speak during the first 90 days. And that's another thing I think a lot of people have a hard time with. because they want to say, here's who I am. I'm here to do this. And a lot of them understand there's pressure in the first 90 days to accomplish those symbolic acts that Neill mentioned, but they don't push the agenda because during that time in a lot of cases, it's better not to make a move than to make a mistake in that first 90 days.

Lillian Liang Emlet: Yeah. So how do you, what lessons have you learned from the stories in terms of how do leaders in those first 90 days negotiate the external pressures for, "I hired you for a deliverable," and even though I understand like, you can't expect that much within the first, couple months, how do they manage the pressure? Is it an internal dialogue or is it something that we sort of set the standard together with the team?

Neill Marshall: I think probably both. first it's a recognition, by the person that, "hey, I'm not going to fix decades old problems in the first 90 days." But the other part is, and you brought it up in negotiating things like coaching help upfront. And you go in before and the board says, "okay, we want you to do this role so folks here's what my plan is. My plan is to focus on tone, trust, and build it." So you're not going to see a lot of really big, sweeping strategic moves in the first 90 days. What we're going to focus on is tone and trust and wins. And I like you talk about, I recommend negotiating those wins up front. so for example, I had a CEO who took a look and was looking at a a hospital system job. And, he realized that the nurses were wait or paid. And upfront, he said, "folks, we're going to have to raise our nursing salaries by 20%." And he negotiated that upfront. The board was comfortable with it, and he was able to come in very early and start moving towards getting the nurses, the compensation that they deserved and that frankly, that they were going to have to have in order to recruit. and he did it upfront.

Lillian Liang Emlet: That's incredible.

Kurt Mosley: and I think that our leaders, in the first 90 days look at it as a successful ones. Look at it as a balance. because if you move too fast, you break trust, as Neill said, that trust is that key. But you move too slow and you lose momentum. I think that is another, key takeaway and that your team's not asking in the first 90 days, if you're brilliant. They're really saying, can we trust you? Can we trust you? Do we understand you? Do your behaves mimic? What you're trying to do, what the memos you're sending out are the, direction you're giving through, emails and things like that. My, My father used to have this saying, and I used it my whole life. He said, "it's hard to talk your way out of something you behaved yourself into in that first 90 days. That's something our leaders, I think need to hear because people don't really care about the memos you write or the things that you post, or the sign board you put up at the hospital. They see what your behavior is. You're on stage as a leader and every day you're being evaluated."

Lillian Liang Emlet: Yeah, that's a really great point. And so, how do we gain trust when you're new to a new culture, like people often move multiple states, And even though throughout the interview process you feel like you have a sense, obviously, you may have network of colleagues who actually also work in that same organization. At the end of the day, you are still stepping completely new into a new place. even despite the interviews and despite the vetting process. I'm curious, what advice you might have for how trust is engendered.

Neill Marshall: Yeah. I think it focusing on listening. again, not focused on making huge strategic moves. Guys like Richard Parks who moved into the hospital, we asked him: "what did you get out of that?" What he said: "my first night spent the night woke up with all the residents, then we were making coffee. And what do old people do? They ask young people how they slept, right? How did you sleep? And one of them said, slept like crap. the mattresses in here are horrible. And Richard said, you know what? I can fix that. He called the VP of facilities right then and there in front of everybody and said, "Hey, we're going to replace all the mattresses in the resident dorm. we're going to take five trucks to Costco. We're buying 30 mattresses and they're installed and we're going to install and I'm going with you and we're going to install them by the end of the day." and that's a story that resonated through the whole organization. And he didn't tell people that they were going to fix things. He showed by his actions.

Kurt Mosley: We had another gentleman, Jim Decker. He wrote, reviving the heart of healthcare leadership. And he had this role. He said, "well, I do the 25/50, 25 role in the first 90 days." And I go, "okay, what's that?" It's something I started looking up in my algebra books, like it was something I missed during college. But basically what it was, is his symbolic act was he said, "Kurt, I understand that 25% of my new colleagues are going to agree with what I'm doing. 50% are going to be on the fence and 25, no matter what I do, aren't really going to be team players." And that's just a fact. And not that he doesn't pay attention to that lower 25% in that quartile, but he says, "I focus on the 25 and the 50% to sort of get them on my side and to listen to them and ask them what they think we should be doing. What are these symbolic acts going to look like in 90 days? if we do these, how are we going to be successful?" So he doesn't waste time with the bottom half. I mean, he's respectful of them and, and deals with them. But the problem is he says, "I have 90 days to establish myself and during that time, these are the 75% of the people that are going to support me, I want to pay attention to and make sure that I establish relationships with them."

Neill Marshall: And then that's really Jay Robinson who, runs the region for Kaiser. said: "I met with all 248 of my leaders in the organization and I didn't ask them to come to my office. I went to their office." That was one. The second thing is the big question he asked is: "if we're successful in the first 90 days, what has changed?" And then he took all of that information and bubbled up the eight or 10 things that his people, the 248 people thought were the most important, and those were the ones that he attacked.

Lillian Liang Emlet: Yeah, so I'm really hearing from you is going to where the people are to actually leave some mysterious C-suite office and get out into the front lines, and especially where the rubber meets the road, where if you have back quality right at the point of patient interaction, for example, the residents, if things are not right there, then it's no wonder that the care and the quality and the satisfaction and the team dynamics are really fixable. If you can't even do something small, that actually is relatively, important, sleeping, very important health factor for everyone out working in the hospital. And then what I'm mostly hearing you say with these, stories is the fact that you go to the people, you don't ask them to do extra work to come find you to report out what things are going well, what things are not going well, and to really focus on the majority wins. The majority, the 70, the 15 to 25, those will carry the culture because even though we do value those who are potentially naysayers, or perhaps they're unhealthy in some way, or for whatever reason, they were just, recalcitrant. In the end of the day, the culture of the organization comes together when the majority of the team is rowing together in the same direction.

Neill Marshall: Yeah, absolutely.

Lillian Liang Emlet: And so these are really a amazing lessons I think that leaders can take away to try to incorporate into their own practice. and this consistent theme you've been talking about really is about this power of listening, very early in the transition. And, there's lots of things that how it looks. Well, you've covered a couple of those, but what gets in the way of doing it well? What are some of the Achilles heels moments for some leaders that you've worked with where they recognize in retrospect — I probably should not have done that and I probably would do this differently the next time. What have they iterated upon for the listening practice?

Kurt Mosley: Well, Jim Decker, I mentioned earlier with the 50, 25 rule, he went in the first day and he said, "in my first meeting I wanted to be successful. This is my first face to face." So there was, in the town where he had taken over the CEO role, there was a Dunkin' Donuts had just opened and he goes, I'm going to make a big hit. So he comes out there with a spread of Dunkin' Donuts, and when he comes in the office or he comes in the meeting room, lays it out and people look at it and do a double take and kind of walk to their chairs and he's kind of wondering what's going on. And after the meeting, one of the people, one of the 25% that was with him said, "Hey, I just want to let you know we've used the baker in town for the last 25 years for our Monday morning meetings" and he goes, "oh, okay." So he goes to the baker and he said, "I made a mistake." But he said to me, "listen, never let a good crisis go to waste." So he found out what everybody liked, what kind of bread they like, what kind of donuts they like, and he got the right ones this time. And when he came in, nobody said anything. They just looked at the box and they went by and they gave them a thumbs up. So again, not on purpose, but he made a mistake, but he owned up to it. And that's what people are saying. I mean, they don't, like I said, they don't want you to be brilliant. They want you to own up to your mistakes, and he turned that into a real symbolic act.

Neill Marshall: we had one that upfront, he had asked forward, look, can I build my own team? I said, "there are no sacred cows. Build your own team. Do whatever you need to do." and very early on, they realized that one of their team members was not performing the way that they wanted. there was something wrong in their relationship. and he made a change within the first month. what he didn't realize, even though he had permission from the board, is this person was one of the most popular beloved employees in the whole organization, and it crashed his credibility. I'm not saying that he shouldn't have made the change. But I would've been much more intentional about making sure that if this person was that popular and that well liked and that well known, that you are very intentional about how you go about doing it, rather than just one day saying, "okay, you're gone." And that was a move that they never recovered from.

Lillian Liang Emlet: interesting. Yeah, so I think what I'm hearing you say in both of these lessons is that there's recoverability factor. There's ways that you can make lemonade out of the lemon moment. And also be careful with making premature judgements in terms of the situation because that can become an achilles heel where you think you know everything and perhaps even though you may have listened well, the decision process is its own separate bundle where you could potentially fall into a trap.

Kurt Mosley: I forget who said this to me, but just when you talked about their first approach, but somebody told me one time that these successful leaders are elect anthropologists. They observe. They dig, they ask question, and then they stop and they listen to the whispers in the organization and interpret that and say: "what am I missing?" you've seen anthropologists just staring at fossils and trying to figure out how they passed or what position they were in. But that's, I think that was a good, I forget who told me that, but it was one of the best themes. I guess I heard from people saying that's what they liked in their leadership style.

Lillian Liang Emlet: Yeah, that's an excellent analogy. I think, it's a skill that we are not often nurtured. We are like, the three of us have talked before about the fact that most of us are promoted because of clinical expertise and being well-liked and being clinically excellent. there's really no, obvious proof that, there is going to be some kind of people management and anthropological wisdom, in that management process. and yet that's sort of the way it is. And so how can we cultivate supports learning both education and also practice that allows people to be able to develop those skills. how do you deal with that vocal 25% that you'll never really win over? that can be really challenging. Any particular group. Many practice managers would argue that having those people on your team can often be a drag. and if they're just a drag as compared to providing something of value. Because there is something for having canaries on your team, The canaries in the coal mine, they warn you of danger. Right. It's important to actually have a very opposing view on your team from you and having diversity. But managing diversity is really hard. And so I'm curious, how you guys might answer this question is how do you deal with the other vocal 25?

Neill Marshall: That's a tough one. Very tough. Decker says, "you ignore the 25 that you'll never get, or at least don't focus on them, and focus on the 50% that you can move." what I would probably suggest someone do is be very vulnerable with them. Say, "I need you on my team. What can I do to get you on my team?" If there isn't anything you do, then you figure out what can I do to get you to find a team that you're going to be happier with?

Lillian Liang Emlet: Mm-hmm.

Kurt Mosley: And I think most importantly, you don't ignore them. You include them on everything, I remember one gentleman told me, he said, "oh, geez, I didn't get the memo." And the CEO answered back, not trying to be in a curt way. He said, "what if I said it, would you have read it?" and then they developed a real nice conversation after that and said, "I send you these emails because you're part of the team and if you don't agree, I'd like your input. I'd like to know why. And I'd like to learn from you what your thought process is."

Lillian Liang Emlet: Oh, those are both really excellent management strategies. because the end of the day they really are still part of your team. And then I think there are, like you said, there's ways to under try to understand, maybe this is just their way of expressing engagement actually versus they really, it's not the right fit for the project.

Neill Marshall: especially physicians. I'll never forget the first time that I had physicians on a search committee and I was presenting the CEO candidates and they were so critical. And they were just, by the end of it, I thought, "oh my God, I've got to start to search over again because they hate everyone." And the reality was they were just being critical. because that's how physicians think, or the, at least these physicians and the end, they go, "oh, well we love these four." "You do?" "I couldn't believe it." but again, they were being critical. but they weren't being obstinate. and they ended up with somebody that they really liked.

Lillian Liang Emlet: your story made me remind how tiger moms are. So being of the Asian culture, there is this philosophy where, you do your criticism behind closed doors, so that makes you better for the outside. neither right nor wrong in terms of from a culture perspective. That's funny, but speaking of culture, some argue that strategy and execution matters more than culture. So we've been staged, fluffy in the beginning here in terms of, trust and things like that. But other people are much more, KPIs and ROI and like really showing me where the data is. Your work suggests that maybe new leaders who misread the culture will stumble. And so how should leaders approach this understanding of like, the culture in these early months, and not really understanding it? Because part of it is that they're also being asked to do so many other things regarding like the numbers and the budget and the volume and the other projects have a much more tangible outcome. And for some people they really love that. And so how do you help people understand how do you balance those two things?

Kurt Mosley: Well as we talked earlier, Understanding, taking the time to learn the culture before you start making moves on it or anything that'll be a counterculture move is very important. But when people say to me, 'culture doesn't matter anymore,' it's just in a lot of cases I feel they don't realize that culture's only anything that's holding their strategy together. I mean, that's really it. And then when you look at culture, you say, "what are the important factors about culture?" you have to understand that it wasn't created by you and you're not, they didn't bring you in to change the culture. And you have to understand it first, and then if you have to deal with it, the culture is being less productive. You have to explain that. But I think, it's a tenfold situation. People say, "well, what are you talking about?" Lillian, you can make 10 brilliant moves in your first 90 days. You misread the culture and it negates that those 10 moves that you did. So it's a multiplication factor and it's very important. because again, in a lot of people, especially your long-term employees, they grew up in the culture, they created the culture, they live the culture, and you can't forget that.

Neill Marshall: Yeah. And you know, the other important thing I think to understand is you don't change culture in 90 days. But what you can do is you can earn the right to influence it in those 90 days.

Lillian Liang Emlet: Very wise thoughts from both of you. Thank you so much. I'm wondering, we've talked about coaching a little bit before. You've watched people through the hunter process, right? Through the recruitment process. The presentation, the interviews. And then on through that journey for the first year, really. I'm curious, how have you watched coaches? I'm curious because now how have you watched people like me, how we help them through that transition point? What have you noticed from the outside looking in?

Neill Marshall: Yeah, I personally, I think culture or coaching is incredibly valuable during these leadership transitions. A lot of times senior executives don't have a safe place to process what they're experiencing. Also, the reality is that most executives are only going to change leadership roles a few times. Having someone in their corner who has seen hundreds of leadership transitions, I think can be very valuable. Nine years ago, yesterday I was diagnosed with cancer. I did not go to my friends and ask them what I needed to do. I went to an expert. I went to somebody who had 20 years of experience and 10 years of schooling, and he was coached me through a very successful treatment. you used an expert. The other thing is the higher you go in an organization, more visible, every action becomes. People are watching everything you do. A good coach is going to help you step outside the moment and think about how behavior is changing the organization. And probably the last thing, I think a coach is going to be able to hold you accountable to do what Covey called 'the important not urgent things.' Everybody can do the urgent things because those are the things that are pushing you, but it's really focusing on the important but non-urgent things that a coach can then hold you accountable for, and you're going to be doing it because they're going to ask you every time you meet, do you, committed to doing this, and this. What did you do? So, yeah, I'm a big believer

Kurt Mosley: and I think the leaders that seek coaching, they create that control momentum at the start, and they create feedback off the coaches and let them know what they do, but they build these relationships with the coaches, learn the culture and they make, a few really good coaching, coaching, advise intentional moves during that first 90 days.

Neill Marshall: Yeah, I mean, one of the things that we're big on is, symbolic acts. and a lot of people don't even understand what that is, and they don't think about it. But if you're working with a coach and they say, "okay, I want you to think about a couple of things that you're going to do very early in your tenure that are going to symbolize to the organization. Who you are, how you want things to be" without you having to say. So, the example I love, my first job out of college, I was a executive trainee for an organization and we had four or five of us that were, all real hard charging. and they fired our CEO and our new CEO was starting and his first day we're all looking out the window, waiting for him to show up, and he pulls into the driveway. And he gets out and he walks through the parking lot and he picks up trash, never says a word, walks into the warehouse, throws the trash away, and just goes on about his bed. Literally never says a word about picking up trash, but guess what? we knew what he was saying and every single one of us showed up early from then on and we walked the parking lot. And Grover Martin never had to pick up another piece of trash because he was telling us that the appearance was important and that we were going to be focusing on the small things. But he didn't never told us what to do. He just showed us. so I may be putting you on the spot, but as a physician

Kurt Mosley: mm-hmm.

Neill Marshall: what are symbolic things that you do, whether it's with patients or peers or whoever. What are things that physicians do that can be kind of considered a symbolic act?

Lillian Liang Emlet: so I think, some things that can happen, are, whenever things can be more, a little bit more relaxed, to be able to have a place for just being human, right? Because I think a lot of times when you're leading a team or you're in a high critical stress environment, or you're dealing with some kind of emergency, you can be a little grumpy. And so I call them 'diastole moments'. when your cardiac muscle relaxes a little bit, that's actually your superpower. So in those relaxation diastole moments, either when you're leading a team, leading a meeting, can you just be a little more human. Meaning that checking in and really listening towards how people are doing and actually caring about how are the other things in their life because everyone's got something going on, whether it's health related or other family. and then I think honestly for the weekends, I mean, I bring in coffee and I do bring in the donuts and things like that. It's like, "why don't we just eat and have a bagel?" like, a little bit of car luxury, I suppose, to be able to have those times where, bring in... sharing food is a big thing obviously in the hospital. And so having the break rooms just, you buy for the nurses, you buy for the residents, just to have a little moment. simple pleasures that we share together. That's commensality. That's actually provides a place of community where it's just like, "Hey, chill, relax, have a cup of tea or coffee."

Neill Marshall: that reminds me on my last day of chemotherapy, my wife came for the only time and I stopped at the best bakery in town and bought everything in the bevery and brought it in for all the transfusion for everybody. again, the food, the demonstrate. And I didn't have to tell them I loved them. I got to show them.

Lillian Liang Emlet: Yeah. so far, so rarely do we often take time just to celebrate all those little things. And let me just say, so those things, when patients and their families do those things, it does go notice. It really does inject a little moment of like, "it's worth it." And so I do want to say that like, and I assume even my mom, when she was sick, you know, when she left that floor, like a fruit basket would come, like one of those pretty cut up fancy fruit baskets that you can use order for. People love

Neill Marshall: those.

Lillian Liang Emlet: Yeah, because like, "hey, thanks for getting her through this next phase of treatment because every moment graduation from this floor to this floor, to this rehab, to the next spot is always important to celebrate all the various people." And there's lots of people you can't even name, like you don't even know their names, but thank goodness that you just showed up to work to be on that floor, that unit, those couple weeks. I wanted to change a little bit in terms of, if you had to give advice to a healthcare leader that's stepping into a new role tomorrow morning. any level. So that could be a charge nurse, a department lead and I can tell you like charge nurses one day you're like, "oh, I guess I get to do this today." A department, lead assistant, CEO, like no matter what level of leadership you're in, what are three small things or a few small things that you would encourage them to focus on in their first transitional months?

Neill Marshall: Right. First, decide the tone that you're going to set before you walk in the door. Second, spend time listening more than talking. Gather your intelligence. Third, find an early win that benefits stakeholders, the people that you're leading. and one of the things that you can do is you can negotiate that even before, like when you're negotiating your comp package. Negotiate an early win, get an early win for your people.

Kurt Mosley: Mm-hmm.

Neill Marshall: Last, decide on the symbolic acts to demonstrate your leadership style. Focus on demonstrating, not telling those things, I think will build trust quickly. And Kurt, do you have one?

Kurt Mosley: Yeah, I just, had it last week. We were at the ACHE meeting down in Houston, talking to probably 40 to 50 CEOs and somebody asking the same thing. they had already gotten a new job, which was great, and they said, "Give me some pointers. Give me some inside baseball." And I said, "you know, many of the CEOs that Neill and I have interviewed over the years, the leaders that succeed in the first 90 days do three things. Well, first they listen, and then they learn from the listening and they build trust before they try to change anything." Listen, learn and build trust before you do anything, and I think you'll be successful.

Lillian Liang Emlet: Yeah, it is really important whenever we have, feel like our leaders really listen to us so that we don't throw the baby out with the bath water and make too much sweeping change. because change is scary for everybody. I think whenever we have a leadership transition, everyone sort of is like, "we're just going to not make decisions." Just with so much uncertainty, people sort of freeze in general and that really doesn't help the organization keep on moving and things have to stay seamless. Operations still needs to happen. Committees decisions still need to be made. Freezing really is the last thing that anyone needs. And so the two of you have really built something very unique and genuine and very heart-centered in terms of, serving healthcare leaders throughout, their transition with these 90 day series. what types of leadership themes are you exploring next and, how do, how can people work with you? How do you hope that this, live, this podcast will, be able to help people work with you and be able to change healthcare for all?

Neill Marshall: Well, the 90 day series started kind of with articles and interviews about these tactics, but we're really kind of broadening it into a leadership discussion. exploring things like, symbolic leadership and early wins, and the role that boards can play. in closing, what I would say is as search people, we thought that helping our client. Hire the right person, what was what we were there to do? but what we think the next level is that organizations then need to create the conditions so that the leader can succeed in that first year. Because if the first year goes well, the likelihood of long-term success, increases dramatically. So if we've got leaders who either are looking to evaluate their leadership team and looking to, attract leaders to their group that are going to be transformational, especially in the first 90 days. Yeah, we'd love to talk to them. They can find us on, at healthsearchpartners.com or on LinkedIn or wherever, in Instagram, all the things that you were doing.

Lillian Liang Emlet: And then Kurt, I don't know if you have anything to add.

Kurt Mosley: well, we created the series, to help in the first 90 days, but it's really sets the tone and the groundwork, if you will, or the playbook, for the whole career, your whole career. And during that time, I remember we were discussing this one, CEO, and he said, "you know what I learned about your guidance of the first 90 days is that, I thought it was my job to do, to make decisions the first 90 days, but you told me and it worked out." He said, "the best leaders, he said, spend the time to understand the decisions that were already made and why they were made in the first place." And he said "that was a success for his entire career." Not questioning decision, but first asking why was that decision made? what was behind that? And he learned not only why the decision was made, but the culture too.

Lillian Liang Emlet: Yeah, I really love this conversation. It's really been a sort of a deep dive into how culture, action, values, exploration, trust all merged together into something that's more actionable for how people can have a sustainable practice as a leader. Because I think that's another thing that we often see in our clients is that we have to first begin with the individual. If you can't find a sustainable way, you're not sort of like randomly going to whatever next shiny ROI or KPI that has to be delivered upon now or yesterday kind of thing. It's really about finding a way to have the habits so that your actions. And your values can make a sustainable team that can really be healthy, that can grow together, row together to be able to make the organization better, it's through all those micro teams and individual leadership styles, that makes that happen. Sorry, I was going to, interrupted you.

Kurt Mosley: No, I just going to say that, our, we look at a search when the candidate signed and the contract's completed. Our job's only half done 50%. The rest of it is making sure they transition into their first 90 days, and they're successful, obviously. And our whole goal is to have successful stay interviews or the 90, 180 days as opposed to exit interviews.

Lillian Liang Emlet: Yes. Yeah. So it was wonderful hearing from both of you thank you so much for finding this episode of this podcast. And again, you can find us at Transforming Healthcare Coaching and you can find Neill and Kurt at Health Search Partners and we look forward to. Hearing from anyone who's interested in sort of how either of our services can be helpful in the process of helping your team, your organization, and your individual leader for the long haul.