Leading With Heart: How Matthew Love Built a Culture of Care at Nicklaus Children’s Health System

For 3 years in a row, Nicholas Children's Health System has been certified and named a Top 100 Most Loved Workplace. Today, we're going inside the story behind that recognition and the leadership making it happen. Matthew Love, President and CEO, leads one of the most respected pediatric hospital networks in the country. As they scale from 1 to 4 hospitals, he's proving that culture doesn't have to get lost in growth. It can drive it. With initiatives like employee-led innovation, real-time feedback systems, and a leadership model called Focus on Us, Matthew is showing what it means to lead with heart and deliver results. This isn't just about being recognized. It's about why they earned it and how that foundation is setting them up for what's next. And you'll learn all about it and more coming up right now.

Care about each other and we care about the customer. And that is the one legacy.

That's the game—

name of the game. And it, by the way, it's, it's not up here. It's here. It's in the heart.

These are my favorite shows to have because we have a heartfelt, awesome CEO of Nicklaus Children's, of a healthcare system that truly cares, right? And we were talking about this before, about how vulnerable we are as parents, giving our children to a place where they're fearful, right? And they're met with love. That's what Nicklaus is all about, Children's Hospital. That's what it's all about. And, and Matt really makes that happen.. And he does this because he loves his job. Isn't that the best place to work when your CEO loves his job? So we're going to learn all about how they became a most loved workplace today, why you'd be crazy not to work with them because they're amazing, or send your children to them because they're awesome and they meet people with love and care in these times of fear. Mack, wonderful to have you on today. Welcome to the Leader Show.

Oh, thanks. Thanks for having me. It is absolutely wonderful to be here.

Let's, let's talk about this. We want to, we want to understand better your leadership mantra to frame this show, right? This focus on us, right? What does it mean to you as a CEO? And, you know, and also, it's embedded in monthly dashboards, campaigns, and conversations across 5 counties. Wow. So tell me more about this. How did it begin?

You know, This is a journey, right? You know, building a great organization, leading a great organization, you know, it doesn't happen overnight. And so when you think about, you know, a lot of organizations, particularly pediatric healthcare systems, you know, it is about the people, right? It is about the heart. You know, we have some very smart people, right? They're brilliant, but you gotta have something in here in your chest too, right? You know, called a heart, and you gotta be able to show it and live it and breathe it. And so, you know, 4 or 5 years ago, we started this journey around focus on us. And it's exactly what it means. It means, you know, we need to make sure we're taking care of our folks, you know, our caregivers, our nurses, our doctors, our support staff, you know, and that encompasses so many different things, whether it be listening to them, leading with them, hearing, you know, what their concerns are, you know, working towards benefits and all of those things that go with, you know, the mantra of, you know, focus on us.

You know, and you talk about this is having a singular culture, people who all believe in doing the same thing. Your values are aligned, you collaborate, and it's more than just being smart. It's about how you collaborate, right? It's about how you meet patients, about how you frame what the us is, what the us really is. And I want to talk about that. You know, when you're expanding from 1 to 4 hospitals, big, it's a big deal. You know, how do you do this? How do you grow fast without losing that culture that you're building?

You know, one of the things that we always come back to, Lou, is really the mission and the vision, right? And when you love what you do, that's actually easy. You know, growing culture at scale in an organization that doesn't love what it does and doesn't really know what its true mission is— and I can walk— when I walk through the hospital, you know, whether it's the doctors or the nurses or the support staff or the folks in the, you know, in the kitchen area, You know, when I ask them, well, what do we do? And they're like, it's really simple, Matt. It's we focus on kids. And so when you think about taking that from one place to four places to two, you know, to six places, whatever the number is, you know, it is about finding the right people that believe in that mission. Because, you know, I can't do it from the top, right? It's really got to be bottom up and hiring those people that really believe, you know, in taking care of kids. That is the first step into our organization.

To have that value from the beginning, it's one of the most important things you could possibly do, right? We— people say, well, you better be passionate about what you do. Well, in this case, actually, you can be passionate, but it's asking quite a lot of people who may not be as passionate about mundane tasks, right? This, however, is different, and you're finding people who truly value kids, children, And right, this is, there's nothing more important than children, right? To have that, that, that value for children is what brings it all together, isn't it? That's really the "us," isn't it? Your "us" is more than just employees; it's all.

Yeah, you know, I get asked, you know, "Hey, Matt, will you define Focus on Us for us? Who's the 'us'?" Right? We got the focus part. And, you know, it is really the bigger "us," whether it be, you know, the folks in a department that are working day to day, the organization, and then you include the patients and the families, and then you get even larger, right? Look around the community, right? How do we do it as a community piece? And, you know, all of us, you know, at some point we're a kid, right? We're a child. Many folks have their own kids or nieces and nephews or grandkids, whatever it is. And so really connecting that when folks join the organization, I mean, I do think that that's the magical part of it.

You know, and that's it. That's really— culture is the anchor, right, during these kinds of operational changes. That's the anchor. It's what we go back to, right? It's our touchstone. It's our touchpoint. And because you're growing, you should be growing, because you have an awesome culture and awesome, you know, so much to bring to the world. And, you know, that's really the anchor is culture, isn't it? Isn't it? Culture is the anchor.

It is. I mean, growth, you know, just for the sake of growth, you know, that'll kill an organization. You got to bring it back to culture. It's how do you replicate, how do you grow that culture over time? Because, you know, as leaders, right, we can't be there every single place, every single minute of the organization, but the staff are, right? The nurses, the doctors are there. So that culture, as you grow at scale and as fast as we're growing, that culture has to be integrated and part of that whole strategy and having it down right.

What we do here is obviously we have a model for that that you've done phenomenally well on, which is collaboration, aligning values, having mutual respect for each other as a sincere vision and purpose that we all share and giving and getting respect. And finally, having those outcomes that we need, getting rid of the blockers to get us to success. And I want to know what— tell us like what role that's played, right, in building trust and retention at Nicholas, because you've been certified 3 years straight. Ranked among America's top most loved workplaces for 3 years. And so you're— so tell me more about— it's not just symbolic, it's strategic. Tell me more about that. Yeah.

You know, this is really— it goes all the way from core operations to strategic and, you know, the symbolic and the awards and recognition is, you know, it's good to get, but it's much deeper than that. It is really, you know, it's got to be part of what you actually— it has to be in your DNA, if I can use those words. In terms of being able to do the things that we need to do. I generally believe, you know, people are good. You know, no one comes into any organization or any place to work and say, "Oh, I want to go do bad things today." And, you know, but it's more than that. It's around, you know, how do you flip that around to get the things that you're really driving for, really around outcomes? And so when you look at it, right, we don't do this just for the sake of doing it. But our turnover is, is one of the lowest in the state. Our retention is, is wonderful. When you look at the folks that we recruit, you know, all the way again from the frontline staff to the nurses and the doctors, it is really around those pieces. And so the results actually speak for themselves, but that's really a result of the culture around being able to get to where we need to get to.

And part of that culture is feedback, turning it into real action, because you're a company that's iterative. You keep, you have learning agility, you have cultural agility. People, there's mindsets shift because you have to be able to do that in a high-pressure environment, right? And you have some really cool things, by the way, we'll mention it, that you're doing to embed that culture. But I'd like to hear more about that and your sense about how agility is a part of that.

Yeah, you know, so agility and feedback, I mean, those are core competencies to any type of successful organization. You know, as CEO, you know, folks try to take care of things before they get to you, right? And, you know, what I've tried to do is let's remove those filters, right? Let's talk about, let's hear all the good stuff, let's hear the bad stuff. Let's not shy away from being able to say, you know what, hey Matt, you know, I was really disappointed in X, Y, or Z. Then that feedback as leaders, then we need to take it in and adjust in how we do it. At the same time, as leaders, we have to talk about it too because not everything that I share or say is always going to be positive. But that doesn't mean we shouldn't shy away from it. When we got to make those tough decisions, own it and be able to move on. I think that's a two-way street. It's not just a one-way from the CEO to the staff or the staff up to the CEO. It is really this two-way partnership within organizations.

And it's in the moment owning it, isn't it? If we see something happening, we do it in the moment, we adjust, we change, we shift. That has to happen in your environment. Hopefully other environments too. We want everybody to do that. So important about agility to shift in the moment.

Yeah. Yeah. You know, this is healthcare, right? It's dynamic. And just like we're doing, you know, when we're taking care of patients, you know, and you find out something, you need to shift the next steps or the next two steps. You know, you need to do that as an organization too. So, you know, listen, be able to respond, make decisions, communicate, be transparent. Those are all the things that go into that agility formula.

And go into being emotionally mature, having mature professionals working in our environment who understand the effect of their actions on everybody, each other and in patients. It's essential. Yeah, it's just essential. I want to, I want to go into two of these really cool things. Ask Nick— I want to talk about Ask Nick and Game Changers, uh, you know, these regular— so because people want to know, but if I, right, you're going to apply, right, to, to become an employee, wow, I'm gonna be able to Ask Nick, an internal AI tool, or do Game Changers so I can have employee— I can actually innovate. So let's start with Ask Nick. What is it? How is it, you know, how does that integrate into your culture? Tell me more.

So, you know, Ask Nick is really, you know, it's kind of our first foray into, you know, AI in terms of the day-to-day stuff that we do, right? AI, it can't replace people, right? It's got to be seen as the tool to help folks. You know, those folks that are afraid of AI, right, the next generation, we're going to hire people who actually use AI. So Ask Nick is something that was born recently over the last, you know, year or so around how do we use a tool internally, so that way we satisfy all of the data requirements, the HIPAA, the confidentiality, all the stuff that you do, because, you know, sometimes when you go outside, there's an exposure there. So Ask Nick really is internal, so it goes all the way from, you know, our frontline staff that can ask a question as simple as, so I'm an employee now for, you know, I've been here 3 years, how much vacation time or paid time off do I get? And it'll go out to our policies and procedures procedures and go grab that and give you an answer. It's also applying to the data side, right? So when you look at, you know, the vast amounts of data that we have, um, you know, reducing the amount of time that really needs to narrow down in on those things that are important. So you can start talking about asking it, you know, tell me what the market share is in our secondary market over the last 3 years, and then it goes out to and does its thing and comes back and, and tries to make life easier for that analytics. So many times, right, we spend time and people think the output is the report, right? That's not what we're driving for, right? It's what do you do with it. And so having AI to do some of those things that are routine and can be done, um, then shifts the action back to us to be able to not go do something about it. That's the— that's when the magic happens.

Knowledge for knowledge's sake doesn't bring us to anywhere, does it? What matters is knowledge applied to action. And tell me more. Have you, have you had situations with applied action where you've seen that knowledge and, and you've said, you know what, we have a great report here, we've learned about our market. I'm going to guess that it's about the expansion to other facilities, right? Did it help you to amass that kind of strategic knowledge mindset and say, you know what, we have enough data to really be able to say, we know this is a good thing for us, we know this is a good thing for our health system.

Yeah, you know, a lot of organizations, and we're no different than them, right, we get caught up in the analytics. And, you know, what do they say, the enemy of perfect, or good is perfect, or whatever they say. Um, that's true, right? And so how do you shift away from that? And so being able to do this with AI and being able to say, for example, on the expansion, right, We know that the population is growing in South Florida, right? More than, you know, there's a ton of people moving to South Florida every single day. Um, still continues, right? Even after the last year, we're at record levels. And so they bring kids, right? Companies are moving to South Florida, and what do they want, right? Their CEOs want great education and great healthcare. And so we know that. So when we start looking at the data and say, well, how do we grow into Broward County? How do we grow into Palm Beach? How do we grow into Collier County? All of that came together. We said, you know what, we've done enough analysis. Now it's time to, to right shift from what is analytics and data to now what is the action, and then what's the implement operational piece, uh, to that. So that's right where we're at right now. So we've used all this data to determine what we're going to do, and now we're off to the races.

And it will prove that there is a chasm between data and real-life humanity, right? It's like, okay, we know it, we have enough data, let's see what happens on a human side. Because there's so many more— so much more we can learn from actually implementing, getting into the communities, talking to the local politicians, right? Talking to the community, having those discussions. It's things that large language models and bots can't pick up, period. They're not able to pick up what it takes for Matt to go in and and have good relationships, which it's clear, it shows that you're, you're awesome at doing that. And I want to, Matthew, I want to ask one more thing, because I want to go in thinking about the employee or candidate looking at you right now. And I would want to know too about the fact that if I come in to Nicholas, I can actually be a game changer. And I can do employee-led innovation. So tell me more about this, because it sounds like you really do give employees a great chance to make Nicholas even better.

Yeah, so, you know, these game changer programs or game changer things that we do, it really is, you know, from the bottom up, right? These are, um, because the folks who are working every single day, right, they know what the barriers are. They know when they're doing 5 steps and should be able to do it into 2, um, or 1. They know when someone's not listening or being able to provide that feedback. So We actually have this, this internal program that really identifies those areas and they're 100 or 120-day workouts. So it's focused, right? Because we know we've been doing this a long time. I've been doing this a long time. If you have something that lasts 2 years, people get tired of it after, you know, 4 or 5 months. It's just that, that, that next thing. And so the ability to, to really do it from the ground up and keep it energized and keep it focused. And then do it like we talked about earlier, right? Get the data, implement, operationalize it, and then do it again and again and again. And so that repetitive piece, but it really is in the DNA of our organization and it's from the ground up. This is not a senior-led push on things, right? This is really folks who do the work. They know it best. Let's listen and take, and take what they say.

You get so much great data from the front lines. So much great data. They're in front of people. They're seeing the, they're seeing the input. They're seeing the throughput. They're literally the things as small as, hey, the carpet needs to be changed. The people don't know that, right? It literally, for maintenance, it didn't get to the head of maintenance. Why? Well, they didn't ask them, right? And there's things— am I supposed to ask them? Yeah, you can. We are here to help.

Right? Exactly.

We're here to help. That's, that's our jobs, right? So I don't think people know that enough. And I know Game Changers does that. It helps people to know that they too have a voice in all levels.

Yeah, voices are important.

Absolutely. And, well, this is, this is just wonderful. And that, that's part of the Focus on Us. Voices are important. Focus on Us is what it's about, on everyone. And that's a, this is a great thing. And it shows that, you know, that employee voice is not performative. It's, it's the engine. It's the engine, right? So it's really just phenomenal what you're, what you're doing, regular pulse check-ins. Last thing I want to do is just direct straight up to people today here, to people who are thinking maybe I should work at Nicholas, right? Maybe, maybe I should partner, I should work. Um, and to your employees too, what do you want to tell them? Like, why should they come to, to you? Why should, why should they really want to work with you, right, at Nicholas in all, all different areas? Tell, tell, give me a chance to say it to them. But that's up.

Yeah, yeah, no, I think that's a great question. You know, this is, you know, what I bring back to, you know, if you want to figure out how to help pediatric healthcare, how to help the community to help the kids, right? You gotta look for like-minded organizations. It goes back to earlier where we talked about culture, right? Similar cultures coming together works. So if you're two very different cultures, it won't work. It'll fall apart. And so to me, it's, you know, our vision is really simple. We take care of kids. We live and breathe in the communities where we provide care. We're more than just the four walls of the hospital, right? There's so many different other things that we can do to make impact. And it's really that focus on the community. And so folks are interested in that, right? Email me, call me, you know, let's connect around those pieces because I do believe, you know, it does, it takes a village to move this, right? This is not going to be done by one organization or one individual. And so how do you, you know, anybody that wants to figure out how to do something, you know, big and transformational and move pediatric healthcare healthcare move the health of children, you know, I'm all for it. Let's go.

I love it. I love it. And I've heard it's true. It does take a village. It takes a village to care for our children. It takes, right? And people who truly care about it like you. You said to me in the beginning, I'll never forget, you said, I love this. I love my job. That says so much. We have a CEO who loves his job and he wants you to work with him if you love healthcare and you love children and you love that kind of thriving environment. How wonderful is this? And he focuses on the us, the community, and employees, and the culture will scale. And he's building this awesome new facilities that, in tying culture in, is that anchor for change. And he has great things like Ask Nick to determine what you're doing awesome in your company. Game changer is giving you the chance to create that innovation because he listens to you at all levels. And I'm just very proud to have Nick and Nicholas as our, one of our most loved workplaces. They've worked so hard to do this, and they've earned it. This recognition, and they truly are living the change they're seeking in the world to help your family, help your children to not be in fear when they go in, but to be met with love. Nick, thank you so very much. Ask Nick— I'm going to call you Ask Nick. I'm going to ask Nick. I'm gonna— I've asked Nick throughout the past 30 minutes. Matt, thank you. It's wonderful to have you on.

Thank you. It's great to be here.