Then only thing that’s constant is change, which means the key is being observant. At least that seems to be the key when navigating the industry’s changing mega-conference dynamic. In the spring, there used to be just HIMSS, with the CHIME Spring Forum affixed to the front-end. Now, CHIME partners with HLTH on ViVE. With a week in between the two, it’s clear many will have to choose one or none, rather than both. Mike Mistretta, SVP/CIO at VCH Health, was able to attend both this year. In this interview with healthsystemCIO Founder & Editor-in-Chief Anthony Guerra, Mistretta gives his impressions of both conferences, provides insights on how their identities are tracking, and offers general advice on how CIOs can get the most out of whatever professional traveling they decide to take.
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As far as the networking side of it, I think that’s where it diminished a bit, for me anyway. They had the whole executive track that they tried to re-establish since CHIME pulled out. But there isn’t nearly, for me anyway, the amount of networking that there used to be in previous years.
I think what HIMSS was trying to do with the executive track forum is have leadership from across the industry. It didn’t matter who you were as long as you had a healthcare affiliation and a leadership job description – there were a lot more vendor CEOs, not CIOs, but vendor VPs and things like that, sales VPs, going into those executive tracks now. It’s definitely, in my mind anyway, becoming much more – even the executive side – sales oriented than it was. And that’s not necessarily a bad thing. On that track, I actually met two reasonable contacts, and we’re probably going to follow up about some product. But it’s just not the same flavor.
This job is about relationships, at the end of the day. That’s really what it comes down to. Where do you want to invest in those relationships, and who’s going to bring the most benefit out of that? Because when you get hit with a cyber-attack or you get ransomware, who are you going to be able to count on? It’s the people you’ve got those relationships with.
Anthony: Welcome to healthsystemCIO’s post-HIMSS interview with Mike Mistretta, SVP and CIO at VHC Health. I’m Anthony Guerra, Founder and Editor-in-Chief. Mike thanks for joining me.
Mike: Thanks for having me, Anthony.
Anthony: Very good, Mike. We’re a few days out from the show, the big HIMSS Conference, annual conference. What were your impressions? Is it coming back?
Mike: It’s coming back. The last couple of years, it was dead, a lot of empty booth spaces and a lot of room on the vendor floor. Some of the education sessions I thought had dropped off quite a bit. It’s coming back. It’s a different flavor, I think, now than what it had prior to COVID.
We had talked, I think last time a little bit, about some of the differences between the two conferences (HIMSS and ViVE) a little bit. I still think that holds true. But HISS has more of an international flavor right now, I think, permeating the conference now than was there before. But yes, it’s starting to come back.
Anthony: Yes, it definitely seemed like a lot of activity. I heard some good things. I heard some people were happy in a lot of ways. I guess that’s what you’re talking about, that energy seemed to be back.
Mike: Yes, quite a bit more. Even the numbers, when you walk around the show floor, there was still empty booth space for sure. I can remember in 2018, before COVID, the exhibit floor would take up the entire convention center. This time, it was pretty much the west wing. It wasn’t the entire thing. It’s nowhere near the size of what it used to be, which is a good thing, frankly. Because I think, before, I was looking at whether or not I was even going to continue to go because it just wasn’t productive, it was more of a meat market. It was just getting out of control with the size. I think it’s back to a manageable size. It’s back where you’re going to have productive conversations with some of the folks that are there.
Anthony: Any specific agenda this year that you were able to achieve or not achieve in terms of shopping?
Mike: We were looking at a couple of things. I told you before we used to be able to go out and meet with some of our vendor contacts and discuss some things. We were able to actually do that and accomplish that at this show this year. An example, we were getting ready to do a Fuji upgrade on our cardiology PACS system, and were able to meet with them and drill down on some things. They did have some folks there for that.
To me, there were two big trends at the show – AI and security. Every vendor out there had an AI solution.
I was presenting there. That was good. There were some good sessions. I had 3 or 4 staff with me who went to some of those sessions and some are better than others, just like what you might expect out there. But there were some good learning points and some good stuff.
As far as the networking side of it, I think that’s where it diminished a bit, for me anyway. They had the whole executive track that they tried to re-establish since CHIME pulled out. But there isn’t nearly, for me anyway, the amount of networking that there used to be in previous years.
Anthony: It looked like HIMSS had a lot of CMIO-type speakers, with maybe most of the CIOs going to ViVE because of the CHIME involvement. I think it’s almost impossible to go to both, right?
Mike: Yes, I think it’s going to get more and more challenging moving forward.
Anthony: I still wonder how the two shows will differentiate.
Mike: I think what HIMSS was trying to do with the executive track forum is have leadership from across the industry. It didn’t matter who you were as long as you had a healthcare affiliation and a leadership job description – there were a lot more vendor CEOs, not CIOs, but vendor VPs and things like that, sales VPs, going into those executive tracks now. It’s definitely, in my mind anyway, becoming much more – even the executive side – sales oriented than it was. And that’s not necessarily a bad thing. On that track, I actually met two reasonable contacts and we’re probably going to follow up about some product. But it’s just not the same flavor.
Anthony: It’s an interesting point you’re making, and it’s an interesting point for discussion as to what degree do you, as a CIO, want to be sequestered and separated, right? At ViVE, the CHIME members were quite separated and sequestered. Is that a thing that’s always good? I know you assume any time you’re around non-hospital IT folks, those people are going to try and sell to you all the time. They’re not going to be able to stop themselves, and that’s going to make things unpleasant.
Mike: That’s correct.
Anthony: Historically, there’s always been either separation or some ratio where it can’t get out of hand, right? Because you don’t want to be in a room with 50 people trying to sell to you. What are your thoughts around that whole dynamic?
Mike: I think there needs to be some amount of protected space for us to network, because part of what we do is peer-to-peer sharing, quite a bit. It’s just part of the role that’s out there. When we go out and look for things, one of the first things I do is I go out and I say, ‘hey who’s got a system that does that,’ right? That’s one of the ways you qualify potential vendors – are you happy with them, not happy with them, what’s good, what’s bad? It’s like a neural reference, if you will, when you go into it.
You need some space to be able to have those kinds of conversations. There’s also some just very specific education sessions that need to be, or should be, just for our CIOs in healthcare. You’re not going to get that, I don’t think anymore, at the HIMSS conference. Another place to have protected space is ViVE; it’s there.
Anthony: You still see relevance for HIMSS, even if you don’t have that networking…
Mike: I do, but I don’t know if there’s going to be as much for the CIO anymore. As a matter of fact, you picked up on it. When I was looking at the ambient technologies for AI, the first thing I did was I came back to my CMIO and I said, ‘can you talk to these guys?’ His comment back to me was, ‘if you’re finding these kinds of people, maybe I should be going to this,’ so maybe I should be sending him next year. I said let’s have that conversation.
Anthony: Yes, that’s maybe how things will go. That’s interesting. You look at something like this, cost versus benefit. Everything has to be worth it. We can’t just do things because we’ve always done them, right.
Mike: Yes.
Anthony: We can’t just go to shows because we’ve always gone to shows. On the sponsor side, they can’t keep exhibiting or spending money that they’ve always spent if it doesn’t – we have to do things that make sense. Every year, I assume, you make that evaluation, and it sounds like everything is on the table; unless maybe you are speaking – that changes the whole value proposition, right?
Mike: Yes.
Anthony: If you’re not doing a session, that’s a much bigger hurdle to get you to go, right?
Mike: I agree 100%, yes. The other one that’s going to be an up and comer and will compete with HIMSS and ViVE is Becker’s. If you look at that Becker’s conference which is coming out, I think in October, they’re putting on a big push now and they’re combining it with finance. It’s got a finance and IT flavor to it. I think that’s going to take another slice off of some of these other conferences.
Anthony: That’s a really interesting point. It isn’t just these two, there’s others.
Mike: That’s right.
Anthony: Then, there’s probably a whole lot of regional stuff you get invited to. There’s the online stuff like me, right here, that asks for your time once in a while (laughing). But there’s a lot of things competing for your time.
Not to age you, but you’ve been around for a little while, right? (laughing) I mean this isn’t your first rodeo. What would your advice be to younger folks with less experience who are getting invited all over the place? I would imagine this is something you learn as you go on in your career, maybe early on in your career you’re tempted to say yes to everything and over extend yourself and go to too many things.
Mike: For sure. I think you have to pace yourself. I can remember the days when I would hit 4 or 5 events at night. You just do the uber thing and move around. Those days are gone. You just don’t have the time or the energy, right? I think, in today’s world, you have to figure out who your partners are going to be, and that’s who you’re going to focus your time and energy on when you go out there.
If there’s a focus thing. When you’re looking for something, that’s one thing, you go and meet with those types of vendors. This job is about relationships, at the end of the day. That’s really what it comes down to. Where do you want to invest in those relationships, and who’s going to bring the most benefit out of that? Because when you get hit with a cyber-attack or you get ransomware, who are you going to be able to count on? It’s the people you’ve got those relationships with.
The Change Healthcare situation just proved that. There’s a lot of people scrambling now to change their clearing houses. I can tell you I talked to a couple of CIOs who were calling around and they said, ‘I don’t have anywhere to go because everybody’s full. They don’t have the capacity to take my business.’ If you’ve got a relationship with somebody, they’ll figure out how to get you in. I’m just saying, that’s really what it’s going to come down to so choose your targets wisely.
Anthony: Choose your targets wisely. You can also overdo it, in terms of being on the circuit or being out and about. But you can also under do it, I think is what you’re saying. You do yourself no favors if you are holed up in your health system. In a crisis, it’s almost now about who can you text or call, right?
Mike: Yup. And if they can’t do it, can they give you somebody who can, at the end of the day. Because a lot of the time, again, it’s back to relationships to get some of the stuff done.
Anthony: I think that’s about all I had for you today. I just want to talk over the shows a little bit and I think it will be really interesting to see how these two and Becker’s goes going forward. But competition is good, right?
Mike: Absolutely.
Anthony: It’ll make everyone better.
Mike: Absolutely.
Anthony: All right, my friend. Thank you so much for your time. I really appreciate it.
Mike: Thanks for having me, Anthony. It’s always a pleasure.
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