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5 fatal flaws of healthcare leaders: inspired by HBO’s ‘Succession’
HBO’s critically acclaimed series Succession recently concluded its fourth and final season with a crescendo of family dramatics and falls from grace. If you haven’t seen the finale, bookmark this article for later. It contains spoilers.
Succession, for those unfamiliar, centers on the uber-wealthy Roy family, majority owners of the global media and entertainment subsidiary Waystar Royco. The plot revolves around the bullishly Machiavellian patriarch Logan Roy and his four adult children, each of them seeking (a) control of the family business and (b) their dad’s approval.
During its run, the show’s endless infighting and fascinating archetypes captivated viewers. But the 39-episode series also provided enduring lessons in dysfunctional leadership, which apply directly and saliently to U.S. healthcare.
As with Waystar Royko, the institutions of medicine (hospitals, medical groups, insurers, pharma and med-tech companies) need excellent leadership just to survive. With millions of dollars and hundreds or thousands of jobs resting on the decisions of top administrators, any major flaw can prove fatal—erasing decades of organizational success.
In any industry, poor leadership can undermine performance and threaten livelihoods. In healthcare, poor leadership puts lives at risk. Here are five dangerous types of leadership personalities, each inspired by a character from Succession:
1. Connor Roy: the delusional leader
In the show’s second season, Connor, the eldest and oft-forgotten son of Logan Roy, launches his U.S. presidential campaign on a “no-tax” platform. When the eve of election arrives, he’s polling at less than 1%, yet he refuses to step aside, still convinced he is capable of doing the job.
Like Connor, healthcare’s delusional leaders overestimate their abilities. Their ideas are unrealistic and their vision for the future: pure fiction. But no matter how outlandish their outlook, delusional leaders will always find apostles among the disenfranchised who, themselves, feel undervalued and overlooked.
When confronted with the harshness of reality, deluded leaders and their followers double down, insisting that everyone else is myopic. “Just follow and you’ll see,” they demand.
Unless senior executives or board members step in to relieve this leader of power, the organization will be as doomed as Connor Roy’s bid for presidency.
2. Kendall Roy: the narcissistic leader
On the surface, Kendall is by far the most capable and experienced candidate to succeed his father. He’s a smart and articulate heir apparent who appears up to the task of CEO.
But underneath the gold plating, his every action is reflexively self-centered. As such, when the time comes to sacrifice something of himself for the good of the company, he freezes and falters, his decisions corrupted by the compulsion to put himself first.
Like Kendall, healthcare’s narcissistic leaders bask in praise and blind loyalty. They reject and punish those who provide honest feedback and fair criticism. Their obsession with status and self-importance blinds them to long-term threats and opportunities, alike.
Unlike delusional leaders, who fail because their vision cuts against the grain of reality, the narcissistic leader’s passion for winning may advance an organization—in the short run. Long-term, however, their flaws will be exposed and weaknesses manipulated by seasoned competitors.
Across four seasons, Kendall can’t fathom that anyone else might be a better choice to run the company. As a result, he underestimates a rival CEO who’s seeking to acquire Waystar, and he overestimates the loyalty of his siblings. In the end, he’s left hopeless and broken.
3. Roman Roy: the immature leader
Roman, the youngest Roy, is brash and witty, but also unpredictable and unrestrained. His penchant for foul language and cutting insults make for good television, but they’re the telltale signs of insecurity and immaturity.
Like all immature leaders, Roman is addicted to novelty and excitement, often acting without regard for the consequences. He’s fast-talking and loud, which makes him likable enough for many to overlook his incompetence. But he’s incapable of filling his father’s shoes.
Immature leaders get promoted before they’re primed and polished. They often lack boundaries and excel at the sport of making others uncomfortable. At times, they seem more interested in causing a scene than creating results. They chase big ideas—if only for the adrenaline rush—but can’t accurately calculate whether the risk of failure is 20% or 80%. This makes them very dangerous as leaders.
4. Shiv Roy: the political leader
In a world of deluded and despotic men, Shiv comes across as the voice of reason. Smart and strategic, relaxed and composed, Shiv carefully cultivates new allies but never establishes an identity of her own. This makes her an excellent political consultant (the job she has) but a poor candidate for CEO (the job she wants).
Political leaders are better at advancing within an organization than advancing the organization itself. Like chameleons, these leaders change with the scenery, shifting alliances and values as organizational power waxes and wanes. While they’re busy focusing on rumors and relationships, they fail to muster real-life business acumen and experience.
Colleagues rarely respect those who play organizational politics. Once political leaders have accrued enough power and advanced their careers to the max, their shallow alliance and inability to drive performance leaves them stranded at the top—with nowhere to go but down.
5. Tom Wambsgans: the compromised leader
Not technically a Roy, Tom is Shiv’s husband and an eager aspirant for CEO.
Once appointed head of Waystar’s struggling cruises division, Tom conceals damaging information to protect his father-in-law. He is a willing henchman, ready to sacrifice his ethics for a shot at the corner office. To advance his interest, Tom repeatedly compromises his integrity, first with Logan, then Kendall, and eventually Lukas Matsson, the incoming global CEO who completes the hostile takeover of Waystar.
In what proves to be Tom’s final interview for U.S. CEO, Matsson asks him whether he will be willing to play the role of “pain sponge,” absorbing any negative fallout the company may experience. After he responds positively, Matsson tests him further by mentioning that he’d like to have sex with Shiv. While viewers squirm in their seats, Tom doesn’t object. For him, every compromise is simply a means to an end.
Compromised leaders are skilled at making promises. They seek support by vowing to fulfill wants and palliate pains. Depending on who these leaders aim to please, they’re willing to slash budgets or raise salaries, regardless of the financial impact. Ultimately, they’ll do anything to keep people happy, even if they have to sink the business in the process.
The three attributes of excellent healthcare leaders
In the final season of Succession, Logan tells his offspring, “I love you, but you are not serious people.” He is both accurate and accountable. Logan was not a serious father and, as a result, his kids were poorly equipped for life and leadership.
The healthcare industry is replete with stories of once-successful institutions falling on hard times under poor leadership. Although there’s no one way to run an organization, all great healthcare leaders share three characteristics:
1. A clear mission and purpose
Leaders have three jobs. They must create a vision, align people around it and motivate them to succeed. To accomplish these tasks, executives may use carrots and sticks, incentives and disincentives, or positive and negative reinforcement. But these tactics will fail unless they reflect a clear mission and purpose.
Years ago, former CMS administrator Don Berwick started a program with an audacious goal of maximizing patient safety and preventing unnecessary deaths. He called it the 100,000 Lives Campaign. And when he spoke of the program, he leaned hard on its righteous mission. Instead of presenting metrics and statistics, he talked about the weddings and graduation ceremonies that parents and grandparents would attend, thanks to the program and the people behind it. Even hard-weathered clinicians in the audience had tears in their eyes.
Financial incentives drive change in healthcare, but rarely achieve the outcomes intended. Everyone engaged in the 100,000 Lives Campaign knew exactly what they needed to accomplish and were motivated to do so.
2. Experience and expertise
Bold ideas and glittering promises always capture attention. Words are powerful and relationships can take aspiring leaders far. But when it comes time to turn big plans into action, there is no substitute for a leader who has been there and done it well.
Exceptional performance, not promises, separate great leaders from the rest—and success from failure. In every industry, past performance is the best predictor of future success. Of course, poor leaders can get lucky and even great ones in bad circumstances may fail. But the odds always favor those who have achieved recurring success throughout their careers.
3. Personal integrity
Emerging leaders can work on their weaknesses. Coaching, training and even therapy can help them quell maladaptive behaviors.
But everything changes when an emerging leader becomes the head of an organization and faces a crisis. As risks and pressures intensify, people tend to fall back on approaches and habits they learned in the past, particularly problematic ones. Whenever tested, the Roy children did exactly that.
After Logan’s death early in the final season, the fatal flaws of each Roy child came into clear view. As a result, the Waystar board made the safest choice for successor: none of the above.
Like a true Shakespearean tragedy, the flaws of the characters in Succession exceeded their abilities.
In healthcare, that’s a guaranteed prescription for failure.
The lost art of compromise
In nearly every facet of our lives, all of us are routinely put in the position of trying to settle disputes or disagreements, whether it be with our spouses or significant others, our children, our siblings, co-workers, neighbors, contractors — you name it. It’s part of everyday life. Conflicts arise and we figure out how to resolve them.
Unfortunately, in the politically toxic environment in which we now live, compromise is now perceived as a sign of weakness. Elected leaders are routinely criticized and attacked by fellow party members and their constituents for trying to find middle ground on any issue, particularly those rooted in ideology. The bipartisan agreement reached in Congress last week on gun safety was a rare and welcome exception.
While they hold starkly different positions and come from states that are thousands of miles apart geographically and politically, Senators Chris Murphy, D-Conn., an outspoken proponent of stronger gun safety laws, and John Cornyn, R-Texas, a staunch Second Amendment advocate, found a way to set aside their differences and reach compromise on the so-called Bipartisan Safer Communities Act that was approved by the Senate 65-33 and the House by a margin of 234-193. President Joe Biden signed the legislation into law June 25.
While the new law does not go nearly as far as Senator Murphy and most of his fellow Democrats wanted by, for instance, banning the sale of assault rifles or at least increasing the age to buy them, the willingness to finally get something done after 30 years of Congressional gridlock was a long-overdue victory for common sense.
Bipartisanship has also been evident in Congressional support for military funding for Ukraine and the 2021 Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, but little else.
Despite the glimmer of progress in our nation’s legislative branch of government, it appears that polarization now has a firm grip on our nation’s top court. In trying to find middle ground in deliberations on Roe v. Wade, U.S. Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts sought this compromise with his five fellow conservatives and three liberals on the bench: support Mississippi’s prohibition against abortion after 15 weeks, but preserve some semblance of reproductive rights for women by not overturning Roe v. Wade or the court’s 1992 ruling in Planned Parenthood v. Casey.
“The Court’s decision to overrule Roe and Casey is a serious jolt to the legal system — regardless of how you view those cases,” Roberts wrote. His incremental approach found no takers among his entrenched colleagues on either the right or the left. Hence, constitutional protections for abortions that had stood for nearly 50 years — and are supported by the vast majority of Americans — were stripped away in a 5-4 vote, leaving the power to individual states.
Unfortunately, bipartisanship can be equally elusive in state capitals around the country, which does not bode well for reproductive rights advocates in 21 states where abortion is now illegal or have “trigger bans” that will take effect within 30 days of the Supreme Court’s June 24 ruling.
Regardless of whether the issue is abortion or other divisive topics such as immigration, gun safety, voting rights, bail reform or LGBTQ rights, governors and state legislators of one controlling party or another routinely dig in and take intractable positions, leaving little or no room for negotiation.
We would all be well served to reintroduce ourselves to the art of compromise, for the good of our family relationships, for the good of our respective professions, for the good of our country and society in general, and even for the good of our own personal health as we consider whether to consume that extra helping of food or another cocktail.
Moderation is key in our lifestyle choices and it could also go a long way in trying to find middle ground with those who have differing opinions. If adversaries are truly motivated to do the right thing, not political gamesmanship, they should always choose their words carefully, listen with an open mind and always be open to making concessions. In short, we should all start by embracing civility.
HENRY KOTULA 