Tanjina Shapiro, Curation Health Chief Operations Officer
Q: The three virtues of being humble, hungry and smart pulled from the Patrick Lencioni book, “The Ideal Team Player,” have become an internal mantra for the Curation Health team. Why do you think these three virtues are important for building culture here?
A: We try to make sure that every new team member we bring on has a hunger for continuous learning and open to and actively seeking out new information and feedback on how we can make our organization more effective. That’s the hungry part.
It’s a mindset more than a skillset. We also want to make sure they have the humility to be collaborative and accountable. Smart plays into not just skill level, but emotional intelligence
Q: Why is it critical to the success of our customers and colleagues that we strive to continue to learn
A: In my mind, continuous learning is how we stay ahead and innovate. What I see among our team members is the desire to learn new and different things – going back to hunger. Healthcare is complex. To stay on top of regulations, business and clients, an innovation mindset needs to be part of your DNA. We have and want team members to always be looking for new ways to create opportunity, maybe do the same thing but in a different way to get different results.
It’s a critical component of our culture and our future success as an organization. To our clients, we are the subject matter experts and guide them through value-based care, which is always changing.
Q: What opportunities does Curation offer for learning and development?
A: I think people associate professional development mostly as paid training and while that is valuable, in a start-up world – a lot of opportunity to learn comes from connecting with and learning from teammates. The beauty of our team is we have people from healthcare and also non-healthcare like life sciences and fintech and non-profit backgrounds.
Everyone has a superpower. We encourage learning from each other. Everyone brings a unique perspective and experience and sometimes having a coffee date with a colleague can be like having a master class in something you want to get stronger at or learn. We encourage asking questions and finding clarity because it can solve problems and enhance communication
Q: Sometimes we don’t know what we don’t know…do you think that’s unprofessional to admit to customers or does it open the door for innovation?
A: Exploring new challenges and solving them always opens the door for opportunity and innovation. Engaging with clients and listening fosters curiosity, another important component of our culture. A client may come to the meeting with certain things on their mind, and we can learn a lot more if we listen. If we listen to understand our customer’s pain points, we can then rise to the challenge of helping to solve them. We can put together thoughts on a solution. It’s not so much – I don’t know; rather it’s the solution-oriented mindset of ‘let me find out’ – which then kicks into gear continuous learning. Our diversity and breadth of experience is our greatest strength. By listening, we learn. By learning, we grow. By growing, we succeed.
