Mark Stimpson is Senior Vice President and Chief Human Resources Officer at Cambia Health Solutions, where he provides leadership and strategic direction for all aspects of Human Resources and Disaster Management teams.
We sat down with Mark recently as part of our Innovator Spotlight blog series to find out more about the role innovation plays in company culture and how he works to lead a culture of innovation.
Tell us about your career background? I’ve been with Cambia 29 years. For the majority of that time, I have held HR leadership positions; however, there was a period of time where I was outside of HR and ran our Medicare division. Prior to Cambia, I worked for a manufacturing company and did three years of active duty service in the military.
What led you to your current position of Senior Vice President and Chief Human Resources Officer at Cambia? I’ve been in my current role almost 10 years. What led me to HR is the opportunity to really impact the culture. My work is primarily focused on changing and shifting our culture to be more consumer centric, more innovative, more change ready. We’re not going to be person focused and economically sustainable unless we have the right people in the right roles working on the right things. That’s my passion and the challenge in a difficult labor pool. One other point on culture and a phrase we and other companies speak about – becoming more agile. Agile companies are focused on their consumer, on innovation to get there, and on ever innovating and designing. All of which connects to a company’s culture.
In what ways do you help Cambia innovate health care? When I think about innovation in our workforce and how I try to drive innovation, I focus on it in four areas:
- Leadership and development— Innovative companies are connected to the consumer, which is why we ask our leaders to focus their teams on connecting what they do each day to the customer. Additionally, we want to develop our leaders to have the capacity to thrive in change, take the right kind of risks as well as to create succession plans and emphasize overall talent development.
- Talent acquisition— We are not going to be a catalyst to transform our industry to become person focused and economically sustainable unless we find and develop the right people for the right roles both internally and externally. Diversity of voices, experiences, and perspectives drive innovation and help us achieve our person-centered Cause.
- Strategic partnering—Our job here is to make sure the culture supports the business strategies and the Cause that we are working to accomplish. As a strategic partner, we work with the organization to develop our culture, while also partnering on talent acquisition, organizational design and looking at the talent and structure we need for the future.
- Operational execution within human resources – The Human Resources department needs to be good at delivering on other parts of our mission, too, including delivering the right kinds of benefits, compensation structures, wellness programs and employee relations. These are the foundation of a strong organization.
Why do you think a culture of innovation in the health care industry is important? A culture of innovation in any company is important, but it’s particularly important to us. Innovative companies are close to the consumer. They think about the consumer in the decisions they make every day. Whether we’re B2B or B2C, there’s always a consumer at the end of our business decisions. If we don’t have this view, we won’t think about them in the decisions we make. It’s critical because if you don’t get the consumer, you’ll never to get to person focus and an economically sustainable Cause.
In what ways does your department deliver on Cambia’s Cause to transform health care to be more person-focused and economically sustainable? As I stated above, if we’re not bringing in the right people for the right roles and the right projects, you won’t transform anything. Our people are the most important way to deliver on our Cause. It’s a cultural issue, and it’s about both finding and developing people. It’s the biggest reason we moved away from a traditional engagement survey to a Cambia culture survey to assess key points on innovation, the consumer, change readiness, and informed risk taking.
What is the most important lesson you’ve learned as a leader? One of the biggest lessons I’ve taken away is no one can do it themselves. You have to do it with people who are different than you, who have diverse thoughts and experiences and are willing to push back. And you have to pay attention to your own team. Don’t worry about taking credit. It’s wasted energy.
I’ve also learned that an organization is not just an entity, it’s us. We are the organization; people are the organization. You have to recognize that people can and do impact the culture and thus the organization.
The other big lesson for me is unless you’re willing to fail and make mistakes and take a little criticism, you’re not going to move anything forward or change anything.
Is there anything in your life that has informed your perspective? My time in the military, living overseas in England and living around the U.S. have given me such a love for the United States. Democracy is difficult and it’s messy, but that’s why I love this country. Our diverse cultures, experiences, and backgrounds end up being the very thing that make this country great and make democracy work. It helps us. It’s one of the greatest gifts of America. As I’ve gotten older, I’ve seen that more diversity helps democracy work. The more we bring in different thoughts, backgrounds, and cultures the better we are.
