Empowering Voices in Healthcare (ft. Vishakha Sant)

Thanks for tuning to Digital Voices podcast, where we chat digital transformation, challenges, and opportunities across healthcare and life sciences. And now, your host, Ed Marx.

Hey everyone, it's Ed. Welcome to another edition of Digital Voices. So excited because not only is it a great friend and a great leader and a blood sister in soccer, but it's also an announcement of something amazing. And so you'll have to fast forward or listen until the 10-minute mark to find out more.

Thank you for having me on, dear friend.

Yeah, it's gonna be so much fun because you and I have known each other for quite some time. We actually crossed paths but missed each other by, I don't know, a month or two. But that was at Texas Health many years ago. You were one of the stars of Texas Health, and I was coming in as the new CIO, and I was like, Oh my gosh, I got to work with this superstar. And you left me. You ghosted me before I even arrived. I mean—

I was actually bummed to not work with you in the week that we actually spanned at THR because— and I was so blessed to work at THR. But then, yes, I was going over to Baylor, now Baylor Scott& White. And so I went from one great organization to another and incredible leaders at both organizations. But yes, but I knew of you, Ed, well before because you were always front center stage. And even when I did my healthcare administration program, there was some case studies of, you know, the physician reporting metrics that I think Cleveland Clinics had done. And there was some association. And then I went to a class where there was a mention of Ed Marx. And so I knew of you well beyond. And I don't know if you remember, at one of the HIMSS, I came up to you starstruck and I was like, hey, Ed. You were probably like, who is this person?

No, no, I, I knew, I knew of you. And yeah, like I said, I was, I was sad to see you leave, but yeah, you had a great opportunity and you've just parlayed that opportunity to an amazing career to match the amazing person you are. And we'll jump into that in just a second because first we have to know what songs are on your playlist.

Okay. So there's 3, like when I would like playlists, when I took that as forever I could hear. One is Chris Isaak's Wicked Game. Love that one. Second one is Moonlight Sonata, the first movement.

Oh, yeah.

And the third one, when I just need a lot of energy and just— I'm at my pits of despair, is Like a Prayer by Madonna.

Oh, yeah.

That's a good— When that choir kicks in, every time, Ed, when I'm blasting it, I get chills when the choir kicks in. It's beautiful.

I love that. Yeah. Now it's going to probably be in my head this entire, the entire day. What about life message or mantra? Are there words that you live by?

There are, there was, um, there was a magnet that I always had, uh, when pre-COVID, when we had a desk, a set desk, and it says leap and the net will appear. And I, I really believe in that. And it's a trust of faith and a trust in just humanity. And yeah, the nets have appeared and some of the Some of the ones that have been so close to not appearing, it's just— it appears.

Yeah, tell us about one.

I would say taking a leap from going from a service-based industry to a technology-based SaaS company. That is a true leap of faith where I'm going in with a— I wouldn't say naivety, but I'm going in there with a mission that's very based on outcomes of patients driven by a business, yes, but it's very core. And when you go to a pure SaaS technology company and try to bring in a flavor of something that they want, it's a leap of faith that, A, it will be adopted. B, you're not making it so exclusive to where those people in a tech-based SaaS company feel like, what is this? We can't do this. Like, you're way— you're talking way too much tech jargon. So many times it's like, stop the healthcare speak. Like, just talk to us like technologists.

Right.

And so I would say that leap of faith is was there, and I took the leap. And it was embraced because the tech companies that are investing in full verticals focused on healthcare providers coming from the industry, coming in with a point of view that's shaping a future of healthcare technology, that is a leap of faith that was very different than coming in from something that I love, which is healthcare. And I knew it was core to the mission of what I was doing.

Yeah, that's a great example. Vishaka, would you recommend that individuals who maybe have started off on the sort of provider side, like yourself and myself, take a leap of faith and work on the partner side, the vendor side, at some point in their career? They could always come back, but what do you think?

100%. And I couldn't tell people more. Just go do it. Do it early on and do it now, especially in this wave of technology and agentic AI. It is— you need to just embrace it for a little bit because I will tell you, yes, do I want to stay with the technology? Maybe. Do I always want to go back into healthcare? Always, always, always.

Yeah.

And so— but the 4 years I've spent here, 4 and a half years of a tech company in healthcare, serving all of my friends in provider land and life sciences and payer land, it's so refreshing. It's so refreshing. The challenges are different. The purse strings are different. The margins are different. But then the risk and rewards and the structure of understanding the buyer-customer relationship and partner relationship, you can't actually truly understand the value of it until now I can say being on both sides of it, it really is a special place to be.

Yeah, no, I agree with you. And that's why I asked the question, because I think the whole ecosystem would be so much better off if we all had time serving in each of those categories, because then we'd all have a better understanding and realize that we're all trying to do the same thing ultimately. And we really need to partner up and not be at odds, which sometimes happens with different organizations. So, we jumped right in, but we really want to know more about you and who you are. So, tell us about yourself and like, where were you born?

Yeah, I was actually born in Mumbai, India. And I grew up very close-knit, you know, very just middle-class family. My parents migrated here. When I was six, we perched in Texas, Dallas. I love it. I loved it always. My my parents are still there. There is where my mom actually had her first foray with medical. So she started with HCA. She went on to Med City at the time and Presbyterian and all that, and she was a coder. And so I grew up understanding a little bit of it just through her nuances and her challenges and her strain of her eyes going through all of the different. books to figure out the codes and the writing. Oh, it was awful. But during the summers, I actually became a candy striper at Presby Dallas.

Cool.

Those orange uniforms with the, with the pinstripes that I wore for the first year and the subsequent years, they, they let us mature into white polos and khakis. So I did that and I handed out things to patients, bedrooms, all the neonatal units and the moms in labor and delivery. And then I also did the scanning of those metal cards that needed imprints on all the forms on that machine. I did those things, right. And so I, I loved it. I loved being in that environment. I loved seeing the franticness of the nursing unit. And it was just, I loved handing out the food to the dietary technician, you know, all the, it was wonderful for me. And so that's where I really grew up loving the industry of healthcare, just from that lens. My dad was an entrepreneur. He did a lot of different businesses. And so he really taught me like, you know, how to take risks and just leap, that net will appear, right? And then I also grew up volunteering at like senior homes and seeing the struggles of like aged and elderly. And then working at these world-class healthcare organizations, I just, I really truly love it. I studied in it. I want to make it better. There's a time and a need right now for a voice that is a little bit different than what we've normally seen in healthcare. And I want to make that live. I want to activate it because across our economic landscape, regulatory landscape, and the changes that are happening in healthcare, we need a voice with a call to action. And so that's kind of where all of this has taken me is I want to make it better. I want us to work together. And we all have a role in this mess-up called healthcare that we serve, that we are stewards of, and patients of, and users of. So here we are. And that's a little bit about me. Apart from that, I also have a very large love. It's my first love, soccer. I grew up playing, did all sorts of schooling with it. And now I'm also on the board of directors of an all-girls, one of the nation's leading all-girls soccer clubs called Pleasanton Rage, where we teach girls respect, attitude, greatness, expectations on the pitch, off the pitch, all abilities. And so it is a wonderful org. I'm still associated. And once I get my 2 ACLs repaired, I'm going to be back out there. That's a little bit about me, Ed.

Yeah, no, I love it. Why do you think the women's national team has been so dominant, especially compared to the men's national team for A couple of generations.

I will say, well, it started in the, in the '90s, right? Well, even well before then, but then is that 1994 World Cup where women, the USA won and Brandi Chastain was out there with her Nike sports bra showing like, let's go women, we can do this.

Yes.

And the stage prior to that team, the Michelle Akers, Mia Hamm was my favorite. They led the way for those stadiums being 100 people to 1,000 people to being 10,000 people to girls like me who had their dads drive them from Texas to Atlanta, Georgia to go watch one game.

Yeah.

So I could just see them because they were the epitome of putting girls to like, use their talents and go do something. And then there was a craze because the women's team, we had funding. That is what other countries don't necessarily— now they do, but the US team had the sense to fund and give them a good coach and give them world-class coaching with facilities. And that sponsorship is what's needed in order for anything to thrive.

Wow.

And so that's where then came the 2000s and the dominance. And then you have the Megan Rapinos of the world that went for, hey, Pay us equally. We are selling out your stadium 10 times more than a men's game. What the heck? What is going on? And so it's that trajectory, and plus the scholarships that these division schools give out. I mean, it's great, and it's such a simple sport. It is the sport of the world. Anywhere you go, all it takes is a soccer ball. It only takes something round, actually.

That's true. Yeah. Mia Hamm. That's one of my former crushes. I hadn't thought about her in a little while. Yeah. And you're right. I was in remote, as remote as you can almost get in Africa one time. And one common thing we had was a round ball. Yep. And those guys taught me how to play, how to play. Period. Period. Very, very, very talented. No. Yeah. I'm a big women's soccer fan, and I've been really enjoying the success of late and the new coach, I think, is just brilliant that they have. So I think there's a lot of success in the future. Look, I want to jump into, we've talked a little bit about the importance of working on both sides, the vendor partner side, as well as the provider side and the benefits thereof. And you shared some insights there. And also you talked about leadership as we were talking about our Our love for soccer. Let's talk about something else that you're doing that's sort of pioneering, and that is you're going to have a new podcast. So, yes, I'm super excited about it. Tell us all about your podcast.

I, uh, first of all, I appreciate you believing in coaching me through the concept of this podcast that I've been thinking about for years now, literally years now. And It's one of those things where I go to these conferences, I go and listen, and I hear. And it's great when you're on site. And when you get off, you feel disconnected. And you can't go around just going to conferences the whole time. I mean, some work has to be done, right? And although the conferences are a good place, but we all know that sometimes they're not. And so I just— I want a platform For women, for women leaders and women normals and women who have inspiring things to say related to healthcare across an ecosystem of actors that are everywhere. And in these healthcare— I know that there is a range of women healthcare podcasts. I want mine to be very specific. It's called Healthcare Hideout. It truly is a safe space for us to have debatable topics. On things that require us to change the narrative in our healthcare system. Each episode is going to focus on a call to action. My goal is to champion truth, elevate those underrepresented voices that shape the future, shape the future of healthcare leadership and innovation. There's no corporate filters. It's not associated with any company. It is truly Me giving a platform to my friends, to my people who have inspired me to professionally, personally seek through hard conversations in healthcare that we all need to be having. Because again, it all starts with us. We know at a macro landscape, our voices may not be heard. But if we individually take some action across a function, We can maybe enable some change within your organization. And if we just do that one thing across several different timeframes and entities, we can actually try to make a shift. And so what's different about my podcast, it's going to be a series. So every 6, 7 episodes is going to be focused on a topic. And each one of the episodes within that series is going to be having a different lens. So for example, My first series is going to be called What's Killing Health Care? And it's going to give a follow-on view of data, stats, calls to action. And then the episodes underneath it are going to represent rural health care, agentic health care partners, and their role of being good stewards of technology—

Love it.

—and being able to then represent inequality and equity in health care. And then the last one will focus a little bit more around the woman's voice in healthcare and how us as leaders in our healthcare entity organizations serving as actors in this ecosystem can raise our voices a little bit more by tweaking them in gentle, subtle ways that allow them to be more represented in a way that we might not know we're underrepresenting ourselves.

Yeah, I love that. That is so cool. One thing that really resonated With me in your description was that this was not just for leaders, but it's for all women. And you're giving a voice to those that don't think they have a voice or their voice is not amplified. And it elevates others because, you know, I don't, I haven't spoken about it much, but I was one of those voices not heard and no one was ever going to give me the opportunity to be heard.

Really?

But yeah, but someone enabled that. And, and so then I was able to take that and emerge. And I think it's gonna be the same way for you, giving voices to individuals that don't feel they have a voice, and they are definitely gonna elevate and become amazing leaders that otherwise would not have happened if it were not for your podcast. So I'm super thrilled about what you're doing and how you're going about it. I love the differentiation. I love sort of the format. That's different. There's not too many that I know of that, that do that, and I love it. So what else will listeners learn and why will they keep having you on their rotation for podcasts?

I think they will learn that A, there's really cool women across the industry that need to be heard. And they're raw. And they're unfiltered. And their dialogue is fun. And it's fun to solve this problem of healthcare. And it can be. And 360 insights that you can use tomorrow. Each episode is going to unpack this pain point of this function. You know, prior author— just data sharing gridlocks, et cetera. But really, from every seat at this table, you'll know how your role fits into this puzzle. And you can have this take-it-to-work cheat sheet.

Yeah.

You know, one metric, one workflow tweak, one conversation starter. Like, that 1-1-1 is like an additive for us to get to this agenda that we're trying to push of taking action. Second is the failures, the fixes, and playbooks. Like, I'm not just going to be telling success stories. I want the real partnership. flops to be unveiled so we can prevent them from happening. Those dollars coming from the industry side are so crucial to the way that we use our resources in healthcare. And then we push those dollars onto patients because we have done a bad job accounting for those things because our partners have been misleading. And so it's just, then the other part of it is a human-first leadership lens from the brave space of communication, of designing tech. It doesn't have to burn people out. Your developers don't have to be burnt out. Your clinicians don't have to be burnt out. And they're all facing burnout at some stage of this evolution of agentic meets clinical meets outcome meets regulations. And it is a state of burnout waiting to happen unless we just— Just think about logically, what are we doing? And taking some steps to get there. Everyone's in this rush to check this box, but like, let's just think about this a little bit more strategically of where that dollar is going and flowing. And that will help us translate to being more successful in our decision-making.

Yeah, I can't wait to listen. I have all my podcasts I listen to sort of automatically drop For me. So this is going to be super cool. So we'll be looking for it in the following week. So by the time we drop this episode, your first podcast will be coming out. So that's awesome. And we'll definitely check back with you as time goes on. So let's pivot now to sort of leadership. Your parents were obviously great influencers on you and the things that they had you participate in. Like volunteering and soccer, and then they're being risk-takers too. Talk about looking for a net, right? Leaving India and coming to Dallas, Texas. That's a pretty big leap of faith. Is there anything else early in life that helped prepare you for the leadership roles you have today? Because you're an amazing leader. So tell me what happened early on in life.

I actually think it's being able to see the immigrant struggles of coming into a new land and having that grit and the makeup of knowing that success has to be ours. It is not an option not to be ours. And so therefore, that kind of mentality about, you know, you saw that movie Pursuit of Happiness. It's, it wasn't, it's not extreme like that, but that emotion you feel after you watch that movie. When you feel that in real life in terms of just the bridge that you have to cross between being culturally sensitive and just being fully ingrained so you can take the most of it, I think that ability is one of the things that really shaped me in terms of this thing of like, you know, you just have to go with the unknown. This podcast I'm launching, I have no idea. I'm fearful. I'm so— I told you that I was so scared. When I asked for coaching and you graciously agreed to it. But it's like that, that mentality of you just gotta go for it. Yeah. Like believe in yourself and your ability to deal with the risk of failure and just like go. And I know that's like cliché, like fail, fail, fail often, but it's honestly like what they forget is like you need to fail forward.

Yeah.

That's the big delineation. And I think that that's like one of the, the core kind of leadership mentalities that I have, even when I coach and lead teams. And it's like fail forward. It's the best advice that somebody gave me, Blake McConnell. It's just solve forward. And it's like you have to fail in order to solve forward.

Yeah.

And that is— you don't have to think about, well, how come? Why? Who said that? And why did it happen? It's like, well, it just didn't work, right? We all know the end result was we need to fix it. So solve forward. Nobody cares about hashing it out. It's those dollars being wasted. it again. And so, you know, we just need to get to resolution. And I— that is such a 2-word phrase that honestly has changed my perspective on how I conduct my partnerships and like business and my personal life. Uh, it's the best kind of leadership mantra that, that I feel like I follow is just solve forward.

Yeah, no, I, I love that. What about taking time for yourself and rest and mental health and physical health, all that sort of thing? So You've got, you're a badass leader, badass organization doing amazing things. You do all this soccer stuff. You got children, you've got a husband, you've got all this stuff going on. What do you do to refresh, recharge?

Travel quite a bit. But apart from that, honestly, I like creating some music. So I like to do my own little, I'm like a, a little bit of a garage band junkie. I usually do it on flights when I travel. So here's my thing. I end up like on my flight time, I will usually do a song. It's my goal, whatever timeframe I have. And then I name it something related to that trip. And so that's, that's where it relates to creating music and travel go hand in hand for me. Reading sometimes, but I kind of find it a little bit laborious, right? Just, it's like you have to be actively engaged in some of these books.

Yeah.

So it's just not, and I actually, I know it's just I actually just like to sit outside and just observe.

Yeah.

I'm with my cup of tea, my chai. It's my, like, if I'm just outside with my chai, just observing just birds or the plants or like just being 100% present in being, that is so, so uniquely rewarding for me. Um, and then the last thing is back stretches, like I love doing good back exercises and hearing the pop and like the stretching. Oh my God. It's such a relief. Like I, I love popping everything. It makes me feel like I'm, you know, flexible again. The yoga thing, one of my colleagues does the hanging yoga and I'm just like, no.

Yeah. That's funny. Well, we covered a ton of things and Before I forget, we do have a playlist, but rather than putting your songs from what's on your playlist on our playlist, I would love to get one of your songs on our playlist. So, we'll definitely be in contact. So, that'll be an original that we'll have on our Spotify playlist for Digital Voices. But we talk about a lot of different things and about your upbringing and how you volunteered in soccer. And we went a little bit deep in soccer because it's a great lesson in teamwork and leadership. No doubt about that. And then we talked about your career, but mainly we were super focused on your podcast, super excited about that. And then we dropped all sorts of leadership nuggets along the way. What did we miss, or is there anything you want to double down on? I'll give you the last word.

I think the only thing I want to double down on is trust is the ultimate growth strategy.

Love it.

We are in healthcare. Trust is the ultimate growth Strategy, and growth is life. So be well.

Thank you for being on Digital Voices.

Thank you for listening to Digital Voices podcast with Ed Marx. If you enjoyed this episode, subscribe on your preferred streaming service and leave a rating and review. And most importantly, thanks again for listening.