WORDS & PICTURES: Gabrielle Versmessen
Determined to have a career in a professional field, Tom McDougal first became a hospital Chief Executive Officer (CEO) at just 27 years old. After running hospitals for 22 years, he is now the CEO at Manatee Memorial Hospital, having just celebrated his first anniversary of employment there in August. Coming from the coast of Mississippi, he saw the opportunity available here, researched the area and Universal Health Services, and fell in love with the company, team, and community.
Being a hospital’s CEO requires many essential skill sets, but Tom also brings personality into his role. His leadership style might be considered a bit unusual to some in that he takes his job very seriously but doesn’t take himself very seriously.
Tom describes his style: “I think I enjoy making people laugh more than anything else I get to do. I’m always looking to be very productive and impactful while I’m at work but also to make sure that everybody around me is having a good day and having some fun.”
As one can imagine, hospital administration is never boring; thankfully, Tom’s personality is one where he likes to do a multitude of tasks and go 100 miles per hour at any given time. It was important to him to find a professional career that matched his personality, or else he’d be bored. Once exposed to the hospital administration side of things, he realized the excitement and challenges the field can bring.
How He Got His Start…
Not knowing specifically what he wanted to go to school for, Tom’s father encouraged him to look at pharmaceuticals, so he went to college thinking he would be a pharmacist. However, after a year, his father imparted some wisdom to Tom, suggesting that perhaps he should figure out what a pharmacist does before progressing any further. His father then connected him with a hospital leadership group in his hometown.
They introduced him to hospital administration, and from that, he changed his major and decided that after college, he would go to graduate school. He received two Master’s Degrees, one in healthcare administration and the other in business administration. After graduate school, Tom started working in hospitals. Years later, he received his Doctorate degree in healthcare administration.
He recalled: “I was extremely fortunate that my boss saw things in me that I didn’t see in myself. When I was 27, he put me in my first hospital CEO job. I developed a real passion for leading teams and doing my part to make a difference for communities.”
Tom’s father had a significant influence on how he got to be where he’s at now. His father had been a hospital administrator for most of his career and also got his start as a pharmacist before transitioning into management. But Tom says his father never pushed it on him.
“I think, like many kids, my dad had a job and profession, but I didn’t really understand it. Then when I started getting exposed to it personally, I realized the excitement and developed my passion,” he says.
All in the Details
Tom’s daily tasks are quite extensive. On any given day, he will have anywhere from eight to 15 meetings, work on 10 to 20 projects, and have an additional 20 to 30 discussions with individuals. It’s a lot of jumping between discussions and projects and working with the Manatee Memorial Hospital team as he relies heavily on the hospital’s Chief Financial Officer, Chief Operating Officer, Chief Nursing Officer, the leaders in human resources and quality, and all department directors. He says that a hospital’s CEO is only as successful as his or her team.
Early in his career, Tom would consider it a badge of honor to work 65 to 70 hours a week. However, he now realizes that the true badge of honor is to be really good at his job 50 hours a week. Even at that, he says, there is no “off switch.” He’s still available 24 hours a day, 365 days a year.
He said: “I really embrace my role of identifying and determining the organization’s vision and strategy and bringing everybody together to pursue and achieve that. It’s exciting to see things you thought of 18 months ago actually happening now. Just the opportunity to be a part of an amazing organization like this one is incredible. We are so impactful to the community. I couldn’t imagine Bradenton without Manatee Memorial Hospital. I take that responsibility very seriously.”
So, what does Tom consider to be his favorite parts of the job? The answer is simple: the constant challenges and never-dull moments.
Looking Forward
“Patient-centered care” is one of Tom’s main focuses for Manatee Memorial Hospital. Tom recognizes that patients come to hospitals expecting to receive great care, or else they wouldn’t have chosen that hospital in the first place. He says it’s not about providing great care as expected but rather about the patient’s experience. Were they treated with kindness and respect? Did the staff respect the patient’s time and personal needs? At their facility, they have over 250,000 patient encounters per year. But the patient that’s there today having surgery doesn’t care about that. They care about how they are treated and how their time during their stay was.
Tom says: “That’s ultimately what ‘patient-centered care’ means. We have to ensure personalized care to be specific to that patient’s needs, and we are 100% focused on that one patient on that day at that moment.”
To meet more needs in the community, Manatee Memorial Hospital opened its first free-standing emergency department in Sun City in April. It will be opening a second one in Bayshore Gardens in March.
In November, they also started a new home health agency. While the hospital field is a highly competitive environment, Tom did say they have 12 major initiatives that they’re currently working on and, over the next five to 10 years, plans to transform the organization drastically.
