Impactful Leaders Podcast | Flipping Leadership on Its Head: Chad Lefteris
As President & CEO of UCI Health in Southern California, Chad Lefteris makes it a point to put himself in the shoes of others, a...
As President & CEO of UCI Health in Southern California, Chad Lefteris makes it a point to put himself in the shoes of others, a kind of golden rule that ensures he and his leadership team treat others the way they would want to be treated. It has allowed them to make bold changes with concern and consideration for how those changes impact the people involved.
In his early days in healthcare leadership, Lefteris felt like bad things always happened on his watch. “For the longest time I felt like there was a black cloud over me,” he recalls, until a colleague told him, “It’s not that the black cloud is over you, but somebody knows that the bad things need to happen when you’re on call.” It was a reminder for him to look at things from others’ perspectives – to “flip on its head” a situation or decision and look for another way forward.
Lefteris became UCI Health CEO at the start of the global pandemic and, with his leadership team, decided to push forward with growth and new initiatives despite the challenging environment. “We came out of the pandemic stronger than when we went into it,” he says, “primarily because of those ‘yes’ decisions we kept making.”
In this Impactful Leaders Podcast with WittKieffer Senior Partner Michelle Johnson, Lefteris shares insights on leadership gleaned from his career across various roles. They also discuss UCI Health’s talent management and leadership development approach which aims to, among other things, help technical experts see themselves as having the potential to lead beyond their immediate space.
