Board boots H&H

Hospital board selects new executive search firm

After hearing the concerns of residents, the Weston County Hospital District board decided in a special meeting on July 2 not to return to the consulting firm H&H Leadership Solutions for assistance in hiring for three executive positions.

Instead, Strategic Impact Group will have help the board identify candidates for interim chief financial officer, permanent chief human resources officer and senior accountant/controller.

Early in the meeting, prior to a scheduled executive session to discuss personnel, several members of the public voiced concerns about the idea of the hospital contracting again with H&H Leadership Solutions.

“We don’t know where H&H’s loyalty lies,” said Carmen Allison, who retired as the director of home health in fall 2023.

Allison referenced what she’s heard in the community and from employees, and Mayor Pam Gualtieri spoke as well, indicating she was asked by several community members and hospital employees to urge the board not to continue with H&H. She cited distrust the community has with the company, and said the community needs to be able to trust who is recommending candidates and helping the board move forward.

“I don’t think it would do any due diligence or justice to continue with H&H,” she said.

Kim Dean, the News Letter Journal’s managing editor, said many people who work at or use the hospital have voiced concerns about the firm.

“I just feel strongly that this firm should not be selected to continue operations in any capacity at Weston County Health Services,” she said.

Angela Phillips, who served as the hospital’s director of patient care before beginning work at Weston County Public Health, said the board, considering it recently had its election, is “at a pivotal point right now.”

“You have a chance to make a difference and to change the negativity that we have had among employees and the community, so it’s so important that we make this change right now,” she said. “And by removing this H&H company, that shows that you are supporting your employees and that you’re supporting the community.”

After hearing from the community, the board entered into a two-hour executive session, and Trustee Karine Wright West, a member of the committee that reviewed proposals from executive search firms, told the board following the executive session that the committee had interviewed Strategic Impact and another company, AMN Healthcare, on June 28.

“We had nice proposals from both of them,” she said.

The board did not request more detail regarding the proposals, but Wright West moved to engage Strategic Impact to recruit for the three positions on terms that the board discussed in executive session. The board unanimously approved that choice, and also unanimously approved, without public discussion, engaging Dr. John Haberle, a family medicine specialist, as a physician with the hospital on terms that the board discussed in executive session.

Board Chair Ann Slagle said in a phone interview on July 8 that Haberle will be providing family medicine services at the clinic, starting around mid-July.

Wright West, Slagle and trustee Nathan Ballard are the board members on the committee that reviewed proposals from executive search firms, and Slagle said in the phone call that it seemed like Strategic Impact was a better fit, considering the firm is based in Colorado and AMN’s headquarters is in Texas.

“It feels like (Strategic Impact) might understand our culture just a little bit more,” she said.

Slagle said that AMN would have been a “fine first choice” too, and if the hospital needs it in the future, they’d consider the firm again.

Gualtieri also asked the board to consider holding a town hall for community members to meet CEO candidates and ask them questions, if several candidates apply for the position.

“Hopefully, we will do a better job of involving the community and the hospital,” Slagle said, noting she was only speaking as an individual board member.

Slagle said in the phone interview that she is optimistic about Cathy Harshbarger, the hospital’s new CEO, and that Strategic Impact will be able to find good candidates for the positions the hospital still needs to fill. Harshbarger seems to be doing a really good job and “taking the bull by the horns.” From what Slagle understands, she believes the staff is fairly happy with Harshbarger, whom she sees as “level-headed” and very knowledgeable about health care.

“I like the direction we’re going right now,” Slagle said.