Three Top Hospital Executive Resign After 'Inappropriate' Behavior at Retreat
By Suzanne Hoholik, The Columbus Dispatch, Ohio
Dec. 15--At a spiritual leadership retreat in September, three Mount Carmel Health System executives were among a group of employees who swapped clothes and then showed colleagues, a hospital source said.
They might have been decompressing, relaxing or having fun during a long day of training with co-workers, but it prompted an anonymous complaint two weeks ago to the system's parent company, Trinity Health System.
After a weeklong review by the Michigan-based Catholic company, the incident was deemed "inappropriate and inconsistent with the values of Mount Carmel and Trinity Health." So on Tuesday, Joseph Calvaruso, Mount Carmel's president and chief executive; Julie Snyder, the system's senior vice president of people services; and Kirk Hummer, chief operating officer at Mount Carmel St. Ann's hospital, resigned from their jobs.
"We hold all of our management to the same standards, no matter what," said Stephen M. Shivinsky, Trinity spokesman. "We learned something happened and took action." Calvaruso could not be reached, and Snyder declined to comment. Hummer did not return calls yesterday, but said last week, "I would love to talk to you about it, but I can't." Trinity officials arrived in Columbus Tuesday and met with Calvaruso, Snyder and Hummer. Shivinsky said Mount Carmel employees were notified yesterday morning of the resignations.
Ronald E. Whiteside, chief operating officer at Mount Carmel East hospital, was named interim chief executive last week and remains in charge of the hospital system. Other appointments will be announced soon to fill the vacant spots, officials said.
The leadership retreat was part of the hospital system's Higher Ground program -- a management philosophy introduced by Calvaruso in 1999. Higher Ground was created by Canadian Lance Secretan who said the "heart of the message is that we should love each other and tell the truth." According to Mount Carmel's Web site, all three former executives were involved in Higher Ground and were vocal advocates of its principles.
Part of the program that September day focused on having empathy for co-workers and knowing what it's like to be in their shoes.
Secretan wasn't at the retreat but spoke with Calvaruso yesterday. The incident in question isn't part of his international leadership curriculum, but he said he understood how it could happen.
"You can say that they exchanged clothes, and you can make it seem inappropriate, or you can make it sound silly," Secretan said of them swapping items of clothing. "That's what happened.
"These are colleagues, people who you work with every day. When they're playful and joyful and act like human beings and not robots, they're fired, and that's a shame." As part of Higher Ground, employees discuss issues in "wisdom circles" where the person holding a stone is the only one to speak. There are relaxation rooms where they listen to new-age music. Some wear matching jackets that say "love, honor, serve," and they all aspire to be better leaders.
The Web site says that Higher Ground has helped reduce the hospital system's employee-turnover rate and create an atmosphere in which people like to work.
A St. Ann's employee, who didn't want her name used, said she went through Higher Ground and said the program took the selfishness out of the workplace, and helped people be happier and more productive.
The hospital's Web site once contained profiles of Calvaruso, Hummer and Snyder describing what they liked about their jobs, their inspirations and destiny. The profiles were removed yesterday.
Calvaruso had written his role at Mount Carmel is "CEO (chief enthusiasm officer)," his cause was to "inspire people to live big" and his "color energies" were red, "followed by yellow and green with trace amounts of blue." Shivinsky said that though Trinity might "retool" parts of Higher Ground, it will stay at Mount Carmel because it's effective and employees like it.
"We believe in Higher Ground," he said. "The Higher Ground principles are laudable and consistent with the values of our Catholic company." Secretan called it a "sad day" for Mount Carmel and said the three former executives are gifted, talented people.
"I don't know what Trinity is thinking," he said. "This is trivial."
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Source: The Columbus Dispatch, Ohio
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