Feb 05 2025 27 mins
This episode of Cruising Altitude features a conversation with Meredith Williams, CHRO at VillageMD, hosted by Nicole Alvino, CEO and co-founder of Firstup. Together, Nicole and Meredith discuss the integration of AI to improve the digital employee experience in healthcare. They talk about how AI can take over mundane tasks, allowing healthcare providers to spend more time with patients, which increases both patient and physician satisfaction. Meredith outlines her role overseeing HR at VillageMD, the challenges of managing a diverse workforce, and the importance of personalized employee experiences using data collected from various feedback tools. The conversation also touches on fostering a high-performance culture, encouraging leadership development, and handling organizational transitions. Meredith shares personal stories and highlights the values that drive their company culture. The episode concludes with Meredith's insights on maintaining a growth mindset and the importance of gratitude and avoiding bedtime anger in personal and professional life.
Quotes
* ” When we think about AI, what I would want to point to is how are we helping physicians utilize AI to give them more time to be with the patients. So one of the tools that we're utilizing in some of our businesses is a dictation tool AI. So that helps to kind of eliminate hours worth of charting and note taking and being able to simplify that. And that gives more time for the physicians to be with those patients as well as the pieces in addition to the physicians giving those doctors more time to be with the patients. That's what they love. That's what their passion is. And giving them more time to do that certainly increases their satisfaction and balance in terms of well being.”
*” We recently rolled out in 2024 our mission vision values and our values specifically around being kind, building trust, innovation and going the extra mile. If you take the first letter of each one of those values, it's be big. And so how do you be big? And so we pull that thread through on everything that we do and ways in which we celebrate employees, ways in which we recognize and put the spotlight on different initiatives that are going on. How are you being big? And that's really a way that we're fostering that culture and creating that experience on a daily basis that people can live by.“
*”Bringing groups together that are coming in in this acquisition world that we have been in over the course of many years, bringing people together and building that connection is paramount for people to stack hands, work together and eliminate an us versus them [mindset]. And that to me has really been paramount in how we think about our HR team, but how we set the stage and set the example for the rest of the organization. It's that tone at the top. And I feel like HR is really that at that center stage and how do we foster that? How are we driving the great connection and collaboration efforts that we see across the organization?”
Time Stamps
[00:27] AI Enhancing Healthcare Efficiency
[00:38] Meet Meredith Williams, CHRO at VillageMD
[05:10] Meredith’s Role and Responsibilities at VillageMD
[06:58] Creating Tailored Employee Experiences
[08:03] Leveraging Data for Employee Engagement
[15:45] Harnessing AI for Employee and Patient Benefits
[18:03] Lessons Learned in Employee Experience
[22:27] Smooth Landing: Personal Insights and Wisdom
Links
Connect with Meredith on LinkedIn
Thanks to our friends
This episode is brought to you by Firstup, the world’s first intelligent communication platform. More than 40 percent of Fortune 100 companies use our platform to connect with their people, design and deliver personalized communications, and gain engagement insights throughout the employee journey. That’s how they give their employees better experiences from hire to retire. Learn more at firstup.io