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No state has fallen further than Kansas in America’s Health Rankings. We used to be 8th in 1991.
Why did we slip so far down in the rankings? The answer might surprise you; it’s based on a leadership challenge.
At the Kansas Health Foundation, our bold vision is to make Kansas the healthiest state in the nation and to do so, this movement must be powered by Kansans in positions of authority and influence to shift Health outcomes.
Starting with the launch of the 2025 publication, Leading Health, written by President and CEO of the Kansas Health Foundation, Ed O’Malley, this podcast aims to break down key concepts of this leadership challenge and actionable ways that we can work together to make a real impact on Health in Kansas.
In each episode, Ed O’Malley, and Senior Advisor at Kansas Health Foundation, Susan Kang, will highlight a chapter in the book and discuss with Kansans who are actively engaged in expanding our definition of Health.
Leading Health is an invitation to move the needle on Health in Kansas, and we invite you to join us in leading the way.
Ep07
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Ed O'Malley: [00:00:00] Welcome back to another episode of Leading Health, our podcast where we dive into this book, Leading Health: How You and 30,000 Kansans Help Communities Thrive. This week [00:01:00] we're talking about chapter seven. Chapter seven is that it's a leadership challenge because we don't agree on what caused the problem or the solution.
Susan, it is awesome to be back with you doing our podcast. We're well into this now. We're having a lot of fun, aren't we?
Susan Kang: Totally. I'm having a great time, and I'm really excited to talk about this chapter. I feel like I'm always excited to be talking about all of our chapters, honestly, so- Well, of course
it's kinda cool.
Ed O'Malley: And this cha- but this chapter's different because this chapter we're gonna be joined by a new guest. So for the first time we'll have Ben Hutton. We'll do a proper introduction of Ben here in just a little bit, but president and CEO of Hutton Company here in, based here in Wichita. It'll be awesome having him join us here in just a little while.
You know, last episode we had Johnathan Sublet from Topeka. We've had a great kind of line-up of people- Yeah ... joining us to help us flesh out these ideas. We're still in the part of the book where we're trying to help readers, and now [00:02:00] listeners or viewers of this podcast, understand that, yes, climbing the health rankings, yes, going from our low point of 31st all the way up to 1st, which is our objective- Mm-hmm
yes, that is gonna require a lot of thinking about health, but it actually is first and foremost a leadership challenge, not a health challenge. So we're, we're right in the middle of part two of the book. We're trying to land that idea. In this podcast we're trying to explore that idea- Right,
Susan Kang: right
Ed O'Malley: with our
guests, and we're having a good time.
Susan Kang: So I think one way that we're challenging those, you know, ideas and understanding that it is a leadership challenge is in this chapter you talk about disrupting deeply entrenched narratives around health. And if we're gonna make progress on closing the health gap, which is a totally adaptive challenge, tell us, tell us what's im- why that is the case and why that's important for us to know how to deal with that, which is a d- which an adaptive challenge versus a technical challenge.
Ed O'Malley: Yeah, you know, [00:03:00] I, I think what we're playing with here is that, you know, leadership is always about disruption. Mm-hmm. And when, when we've been as a state falling in the health rankings from our h- high point of number eight- All the way down to number 31, and as we've explored on this podcast, a pretty steady fall up until the last few years, which for the first time- Right
Kansas health, K- the Kansas, the state of Kansas, for the first time, the state of Kansas has climbed better in the health rankings for three consecutive years. Mm-hmm. That's a big deal. That's attributed to a lot of people doing a lot of things. But when you're sliding like that for as long as Kansas had been sliding, you have to question everything.
Mm-hmm. And it's, it's not a situation where the way we turn that around is just to dive into you know, the health textbooks. We have to really question how, how are we doing things? How are we trying to solve this problem? The, the great, [00:04:00] wonderful people who get up every day and work on health, you know, how much of solving that problem, the slide in the rankings, actually belongs to them versus, as we're, the case we're trying to make in this book, how much of solving that problem belongs to what we call the 30,000?
30,000, mm-hmm. The Kansans who are in key roles of civic authority and business life and elected life and in the faith community. So leadership is always about disrupting how we think before we get to actually making progress, and I think that's where, what we're getting at in this chapter.
Susan Kang: So tell me a little bit about how the 30,000 need to help create alignment between the problem and the solution and the path forward.
Ed O'Malley: During COVID, I became obsessed with trying to think about what's the role of authority-
Susan Kang: Mm-hmm
Ed O'Malley: in solving tough problems. Like, you and I know leadership is an activity, it's not a position. [00:05:00] Right. Right? We explore that in this book. We talked about that earlier in this book. Right. Leadership is an activity, it's not a position. Now, a lot of people would, would agree with that, but then most people, and I think myself 20, 25 years ago, would've said, "Yeah, but it's an activity for people in key roles of authority."
And, and now I think that's been debunked, right? Yeah, yeah. I think there's plenty of knowledge and wisdom now in the world that says, no, it's just an activity period. Whether you have authority or not is an interesting question, but Rosa Parks didn't have authority- Mm-hmm ... and she exercised tremendous leadership.
So, so leadership must not be related to authority is what we began to explore. So during COVID, I became obsessed with thinking about, okay, if, if leadership and authority are two different things, and sometimes people in authority exercise leadership- And sometimes they don't
Susan Kang: Right.
Ed O'Malley: Leadership is really rare. What I became obsessed with was, well, oh, okay, but specifically, what are, like what do [00:06:00] we need from those in authority when it comes to deep, daunting, the language we use, adaptive challenges?
Right Like, what's the role of those? And I remember watching during COVID, and I think one of the big mistakes a lot of people in authority made, and I'm not, you know, saying they're horrible people. They were under a lot of pressure. But I think a lot of... one of the mistakes a lot of people in authority made was trying to proclaim solutions.
Mm-hmm Trying to say, "Here's exactly what we need to do." And I, I think on deep, daunting challenges, like, this is a long answer to your question, Susan, but- Mm-hmm ... like trying to close a health gap, like trying to climb the health rankings, one of the roles of authority is to get people focused on the problem, first and foremost.
Like, center the problem. I, I don't think people in authority, I don't think, you know, that the healthcare CEOs, I don't think that the, the, the wonderful people in public health, I, I don't think they have [00:07:00] the ability to fully solve this all by themselves. So other people in roles of authority helping say, "This is the issue that matters.
This is something we have to align around. This is something that is important to us in our company, in our organization, in our state, in our community," is one of the roles we're talking about. And when we talk about creating alignment, I think that's what we're talking about. Like, let's first align on this problem matters.
Susan Kang: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm
Ed O'Malley: that's a lo- a large part of what we're trying to do here at KHF the last couple years is get key people in the state to say, "The fact that we fell in the health rankings matters."
Susan Kang: Yeah. Well, I, I also love the fa- there's a part in the book where you talk about you don't have to define the whole problem, not not in one big chunk immediately, right?
One of the things we can do is to define what is our part in this problem, situation, topic, issue,
Ed O'Malley: the whole idea of it's so much easier to define somebody else's part of the mess. Yeah. [00:08:00] You know? Yeah. And, and like every, you know, every faith tradition, ev- every spiritual tradition has a version of b- before you, you know, criticize the speck in your neighbor's eye, take the plank out of your own.
Yeah Which I, I, I think is just a way of saying- On these deep, daunting challenges, we literally all have a part of the mess.
Susan Kang: Yeah.
Ed O'Malley: My part, your part might not be the whole problem, but it's literally, like, your part. Yeah, yeah. And, and, and, like, if we can just help people define what's your part of the mess of this kind of slide in health.
And, you know, if you think about it, like, if we can just help you know, we're gonna be joined by, by Ben here in a little bit. If we can help a, a, a business understand what's their part of this, if we can help an elected official. Think about, like, a, a school board member who might think "Uh, what do I have to do with health?"
Well, you have a lot to do with health. If we can just help them- Right ... understand their part-
Susan Kang: Right ...
Ed O'Malley: and if we can [00:09:00] define our part, the problem's usually not that big.
Susan Kang: Yeah. I mean, I, I think that's like, it's a practical way for us, for members of the 30,000 and others who are working with members of the 30,000, right?
To identify some practical and, and concrete ways to figure out how to make progress in helping Kansas close the health gap, and so that's what I like about that. And the other thing, and one last thing I'm gonna ask you about, is so distinguishing, you distinguish between goals and strategies in the way that we can make progress on our daunting challenges.
So I'm just, if, if y- I feel like that is also a little bit of a practical step. People can understand the difference and, you know, and take steps that way. So can you tell us a little bit about that? Yeah.
Ed O'Malley: I think, I think what we're playing with on that idea, Susan, is that especially those in authority, you know, the 30,000- Mm-hmm
people in key roles of authority, one of the things that we need them to do is to help people understand the difference between our goals and our [00:10:00] preferred strategies to get there. a lot of us have different ideas for how to create a healthier workforce in a company, a healthier community- Right
a healthier state, and what often happens is we end up debating, we often end up debating our preferred strategies-
Susan Kang: Mm-hmm ...
Ed O'Malley: before we've got an alignment on, but what's the goal?
Susan Kang: Mm-hmm.
Ed O'Malley: And it's one of the special roles of people in authority is to help people see the difference and say, "You know what? We can debate strategies in a while, but can we first get agreement that this goal matters?"
Susan Kang: Mm-hmm, mm-hmm.
Ed O'Malley: And can we first kind of explore what makes progress on this goal difficult? And what, what we found, what research shows, is when people in authority help others kind of see the difference between a goal and a strategy- Mm-hmm ... you know, so a, a strategy is to do Medicaid expansion.
Susan Kang: Mm-hmm. [00:11:00]
Ed O'Malley: A goal is to make sure- As many Kansans as possible have- Insurance ... have adequate health insurance.
Susan Kang: Ins- yeah, 100%. Medicaid
Ed O'Malley: expansion is not a goal. It's a strategy to achieve a goal. When people in authority, my experience and the research shows that when people in authority help others see the difference between those things, those groups end up making progress faster- Mm-hmm
which is really a beautiful thing. Love it. So much more to explore, but let's explore with our friend Ben. So Ben Hutton for those who haven't been exposed to Ben, he's a creative thinker. He is one of the most innovative business CEOs that, that I've ever known. He leads Hutton Company, which is based here in Wichita, but doing work across the state.
Has built an amazing team, and we're excited to have him on this podcast with us to explore this chapter. I
Susan Kang: am too. Yeah. Let's- I'm really excited about this conversation with Ben.
Ed O'Malley: Let's bring him up.
Susan Kang: so excited to have you.
Ben Hutton: I'm glad to be here. Thanks for having me on. I appreciate it. Yeah
Susan Kang: What's really notable about your appearance today is that you are the [00:12:00] first and really, I think only person who represents the private sector.
Fantastic.
Ed O'Malley: Well, well, well-
Ben Hutton: No pressure
Ed O'Malley: ... not in the world. You're the person- Yeah ... on this podcast at this moment. Well, just how
Susan Kang: about... Yeah, I'm just saying, just right now. I'm just, you know, just saying right now. Well, but it sounded- Okay. Well, I'll try- It sounded better when I said it
I'll try and do
Ben Hutton: a good job at that. Yeah.
Ed O'Malley: But, what's
so interesting, Ben, is you are in some ways an amazing representative of the private sector. In other ways, y- y- I mean, you, you kind of have a whole different approach to how you run your company, to how you have created a successful enterprise. So on one hand, you're an example of.
On the other hand, you might be a model of- Sure ... what we need more private sector companies to think about.
Susan Kang: Okay, now it's, now there's a lot of pressure on you if you're, if you're the model here, so. I feel
Ben Hutton: it. I feel
Susan Kang: it. Okay, awesome. Yeah. That's really great. But you know, thank you for, for being here with us and letting us ask you some questions about some of these concepts.
Ben Hutton: Sure. Yeah. So I'm, I'm excited to share my perspective. Yeah. Yeah. It's an important topic, and I'm glad that we're having this discussion in our state.
Susan Kang: So you know that at KHF we talk about the capital H health. Yes. Which we [00:13:00] define as, you know, everything that we need to thrive, as opposed to the small H health- Mm-hmm
which just, is just healthcare, which is also important, but only part-
Ed O'Malley: Yep ...
Susan Kang: of capital H health, right? So in your organizations you know, as CEO of Hutton and as a member of the 30,000, how d- how does health, the capital H health, come into play in your organizations? And can you are there some elements of capital H health that you might be focused on right now that that might be helpful, you know, for us to know about?
Ben Hutton: Well, we think about little H health and capital H health- Mm-hmm ... both at our company. You know, from the little H perspective, of course, we, we want to provide great health insurance benefits to our team members and help them focus on that part of their life. Yeah. Yeah. But bigger than that, you know, our purpose statement at Hutton is together we exist to build life into our team members' dreams, clients' vision and communities' future.
Mm-hmm. And we really see a role for our company in helping our team members achieve the dreams that they have in their life- Mm-hmm ... which I think is really what capital [00:14:00] H health is all about. You know, if they're not little H health healthy they have a hard time doing that, and so we help them get there.
But then beyond that we talk a lot about what they want to achieve in their life- Mm-hmm ... why do they show up to work every day, who or what are they working for, and how can we help them pursue those dreams? And so we have things like chaplain services or assistance funds, provide time off for volunteering, th- things that build the vitality and wholeness of life outside of just the Blue Cross Blue Shield health insurance program we provide, which is great, and everybody loves
Ed O'Malley: i, I want, I wanna just dig a little bit because- Yeah ... ben, you are an avid reader. Mm-hmm. I know you read a lot of books. And I know a few years ago you read a book called The Dream Manager. Yep. Is that the name of it? It is. Yep. Yeah. Great little book. Yeah. And it, it, the, the book is, is about this idea of, of putting in place a process to help your team members identify, like name their [00:15:00] dream And then achieve it.
And you all have implemented that process- Yeah ... in your company. I happened to have a conversation recently with, with o- one of your dream coaches. Mm-hmm. And I was just so inspired. So talk about an example of capital H health. Can you just describe what that looks like? 'Cause I, I, again, it, it's a phenomenal example of how to not just say we care about capital H health, but to actually have something incredibly tangible to bring it to life.
Ben Hutton: Yeah. So our purpose statement is, it does say we wanna help our team members pursue their dreams in life. And we actually had that as our purpose statement for a couple years before one day I woke up and I said that sounds great, but what are we doing?
Like, how are we actually doing that?" And it was then that I remembered that previously I had read this book about a company that did exactly that. Mm-hmm. And so, we copied their playbook. And we hired a dream manager, a coach to help facilitate conversations with our team members and their [00:16:00] families to really identify what it is that they're passionate about in their work and life and then help them make plans to pursue those dreams and goals.
We've had some amazing things happen with we're on our third cohort of team members going through the, the program. We've had one of our team members took a trip and climbed Machu Picchu with his brother. Another- Nice ... bought a house, another went back to school, another is sending their children to college for the first time in their, in their family.
And so some really amazing things that have so much meaning to those team members. You know, I, I think in business oftentimes, and especially, like, the business school version of business, we assume people show up at work because of the paycheck or the benefits that we provide, and those are all important.
Like, we learn about Maslow's hierarchy of needs in Psychology 101- Mm-hmm ... with the 700 people in the big auditorium- Mm-hmm ... our freshman year. [00:17:00] K-State, go, go Cats. Go Cats. But we move pretty quickly beyond that bottom tier. I mean, when we satisfy some of those initial needs of security we, we look up pretty quickly and say like, "What else is there?
And what am I excited about in life? And where do I find joy and passion? And where is my spot to plug in in the community?" And that's where I think we get a lot more reward. So it's been rewarding for our company to see our team members' eyes glimmer when they get glimpses of that themselves, and it's been really rewarding for me as the leader of our business to help people do that.
Ed O'Malley: That's an incredible story. Yeah. Yeah,
Susan Kang: incredible. That sounds like such amazing examples of thriving. Yeah, for sure. Right? Mm-hmm. That's just... Yeah, that's just fabulous. Well, and Susan,
Ed O'Malley: I would bet, I'd bet a lot of money, that those people and their families who have been impacted through the Dream Manager process in your company, Ben, I would bet a lot of money that on tr- more traditional lower H health measures- Mm-hmm[00:18:00]
they are healthier.
Susan Kang: 100%. You know?
Ed O'Malley: And, that's the point. Like, health isn't... Like, the percent of our health that is attributed to doctors' offices and, and dental visits, while those things are critically important, and we love all the doctors, and we love all the dentists, and we love all the nurses, and we love all the healthcare professionals, but our health is so much more impacted by the things like you were just describing.
Mm-hmm. You know, like, is our family in a home for the first time? Mm-hmm. You know, those things matter, and they set the trajectory for health for, for generations. All right, we, we went big picture- Yeah ... Susan.
Susan Kang: So, you know, at the beginning of this e- episode, we're- Ed and I were talking about sort of aligning problems with solutions. And so in your... Because you have, like, seven different companies, right, under Hutton, I can imagine that you have a bunch of different people who already k- who feel like, "I know what the problem is, and I know exactly what the solutions are."
So curious to know how you might align [00:19:00] the, the problem and solution when, when you've got a bunch of people who are sort of experts at doing that.
Ben Hutton: Uh, Sometimes more successfully than others. How's that for an answer? No, I think uh, it's, it's actually what I spend quite a bit of my time doing- Mm.
Mm-hmm ... is trying to focus people on the, the right problems, Mm ... and, and searching for the right solutions for those. Mm. Mm-hmm. You know, one of the frames that I like to use for this is, is another book that I've read that I love by Simon Sinek, where it's called The Infinite Game. Okay. And he talks about how we look at business in two different frames as, one, a finite game or things that we can win or lose or infinite games or games that go on forever.
Mm-hmm. So putting it back into this conversation health is not something we get to win. Like, it will go on forever. Yeah. And the way we approach things like that have to be different than things that are finitely measurable. You know, a response that is [00:20:00] time-limited and critical during COVID is somewhat a finite game.
Mm-hmm. Right. Yeah. But how we move from you know, 31st to 1st in health in Kansas over decades is different. And then, and then stay there. And then stay there- Right ... i- is is infinite. And so we have to, we, we have to have different approaches. So we have to frame up, are we, are we chasing something that is finite and achievable soon or infinite?
And then I think we have to give permission to leaders that have influence and knowledge- To experiment. Mm-hmm ... so one of the blessings that I think I have in the private sector that doesn't always exist in the public sel- sector is my ability to move fast and try things, especially when those experiments or decisions are reversible.
Hmm ... so in our company we have a frame that we call $50,000 experiments. So every year I wanna try something just a [00:21:00] little bit crazy crazy enough- We, we
Susan Kang: know about those things here ...
Ben Hutton: oh, yeah, yeah. Yeah, that's just true. You take risks. That's one of your values, right? That's what we
Susan Kang: do.
Ben Hutton: But a big enough experiment that if it works, it's gonna be something amazing but small in scale enough that if it doesn't work, then we learn something and we move on. And I think private sector businesses and, and some nonprofits that are working at the edges of some of this health problem should be taking more risk and, and doing more experiments- ~Hmm~
~uh, ~because sometimes it's easier to bring people along with results or examples than with arguments or ideas. And so, we love experiments.
Ed O'Malley: two big things you just said that, that I think are applicable for all the 30,000, right? So the 30,000 Kansans in roles of civic authority, these are pastors, rabbis, university presidents, college deans, school superintendents, community-minded business CEOs, elected officials at all levels, appointed officials.
Two big things you just mentioned that I think are, are, are ways for the 30,000 to think about their role [00:22:00] on improving health. One of them is focusing people on the right problems. Like, that, that ... And I love the way you talked about it. My, my, my follow-up question in just a minute is gonna be how do you help people define right?
How do you help people define what the right problem is? But it sounds like such a great example of what do we need from the 30,000. We don't need the 30,000 to solve everything. Mm-hmm. We need them to do their part. We don't need people in authority to solve everything.
We need them to do their part. And the second thing you talked about is experimentation, and the way I interpreted that is, like, we need the 30,000 to help create an environment where the people working on this can experiment in the way you just described. Hmm. It's not a risk-free experiment, but we need the environment where people feel like they can take those risks.
So I, I love that, and I think it's some great instruction to the 30,000. But, but yeah, how do, how do, how do we help people [00:23:00] define what right means when we're helping them focus on the right problems?
Ben Hutton: So I think this gets back to root cause analysis or looking past the immediate symptoms that may draw our attention and trying to find what are the issues or problems that we can solve that unlock or solve future problems that we don't even see yet.
It's one of the reasons I love a leading indicator like third-grade literacy right? Focusing our attention all the way back at that point pays dividends five and 10 and even 15 years- Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm ... down the road. Whereas, you know, that might show up in challenges getting a job or purchasing a home or having access to healthcare.
If we can solve those problems back in, or the, a problem back in third grade then we prevent many more things down the line, so.
Susan Kang: That sounds like going- Yeah ... upstream.
And really getting at to the- Mm-hmm ... at, at, at the cause of the problem initially. Yes. Yeah. That sounds really great.
One of the things [00:24:00] that that came up for me as you were talking about experimenting is this notion that Ed talks about at KHF, which is failing fast and failing forward.
Ed O'Malley: Yeah.
Susan Kang: So with your $50,000 experiments, the i- you know, idea that you probably learned something from this, some of these failures, right?
Yep. And that makes your second experiment even better, or it, you know, it allows for a third experiment that, that you didn't think about before. And I, you know, I love that you have that mindset. I think that's one of the things that we need to make progress on adaptive challenges.
Ben Hutton: Yeah, I think we always learn something from them, even if all we learn is that that didn't work. Right. Then that is valuable. That's data. Because so often we get anchored into this, "I've got this great idea. I wanna try it. I wanna try it." And we tell seven people about it, and I've got this idea, and it's like, we spent so much time talking about it, we could have tried it-
already and moved on when it didn't work- Yeah ... uh, to something that might. And so, experiments are- I, yeah ... super
Susan Kang: valuable. No, I love that. Just, just try it. I love that.
Ed O'Malley: Small ways. Well, in good ways and bad ways. Yeah, yeah. Like, one of [00:25:00] the best ways to let somebody know their idea is a bad one is just let them try it, right?
Yeah, yeah. Go, go for it. Yeah, it's like, okay. And, and it might actually work, and then we're the fool, right? Yeah, yeah. Exactly. We're the ones who thought it was a bad idea. Yeah. Yeah, I've
Ben Hutton: done that several times with my kids. It's like, sounds like a bad idea, but go for it." "Let me know how that turns out."
And sometimes they prove me wrong, so right?
Susan Kang: It's, it's great. Or, or they prove you right, and then you're like- Yeah, no- ... "Okay, well" ... and then it's like, well, I guess- And so, it's a good lesson learned, right? Yeah. Yeah, I guess
Ben Hutton: Dad's not so dumb. But that's okay.
Susan Kang: I, I wanna go back to the, this notion of ha- disrupting entrenched ideas or, you know, interpretations and narratives that we might have, in your, sort of in your company or, you know, or elsewhere, right?
Can you talk about a time when you felt like you had to become curious about challenging the narrative that you had, this, you know, that, that was potentially an entrenched narrative that you were that you, you needed to disrupt to make progress?
Ben Hutton: Yeah, I mean, I, I'd go back a little bit to the example that I had earlier or that we talked about earlier about the dream [00:26:00] manager. You know, the, the core assumption there that I had to challenge is wh- why do people work- Mm-hmm ... inside of our organization? Mm-hmm. Because there was a lot of blank faces and stares when, when I said, "Hey, I, I have this idea and I wanna try this thing."
And they're like, "Man we're a construction company. We're, we want sticks and bricks and we wanna talk about paychecks and hard, measurable things." Yeah. And I showed up in the room and I'm talking about dreams and visions and love and human connection. And they're like, "Well, who the heck is this guy," right?
And so we had to challenge, like, "Well, why do you show up at work, Jim?" Mm-hmm. "Why do you come to work Steve?" And when you peel back the layers, there's always something more human- Mm ... underneath of it. And so that was one example. You know, the, the other example that I would throw out would be just from a, the purpose of our business perspective.
I mean, I [00:27:00] think we go to business school we grow up in our economics classes, and we learn about shareholder value and profit and loss statements and balance sheets and that becomes the frame that we measure the impact of business through and how we judge success. And I think that's part of it.
Like- Yeah ... I love all of those things but I think it's just a small piece of the picture of what it can be. And so I've had to challenge for our organization how we are measuring success outside of those instruments. And ultimately the proof is in the pudding.
It works well. And I think the ironic thing is actually businesses that are run from a purpose and values perspective end up more profitable stronger businesses- Yes ... on the balance sheet in the end. But it takes a while for people to come around to that, and it takes a while to prove it, so.
Ed O'Malley: Y- y- yeah, Ben, I I, I'm glad you went to where you did at the very end of that because I, I wanna... Without disclosing, you know, the company's P&L and balance sheet and all that kind of stuff, but [00:28:00] m- my guess is- That the interventions, a little bit of a wonky word there, the efforts you, the experiments you all have done to work on capital H health have ended up contributing to your company being more successful in those traditional measures.
Sure. Is that fair to
Ben Hutton: say? Uh, 100%. Yeah. Yeah. 100%.
Ed O'Malley: But what I love about the story you told is you had to get people to question their own narratives about how do we make the company successful in the traditional sense, and you still have to do all that traditional sense stuff. Mm-hmm. Yeah. You know, so my guess is you weren't telling your team...
And I can picture some of your senior people saying like, "What? You want us to do what?" You weren't telling them that we're gonna stop doing all that business school stuff. Yeah. You were, in essence, saying, "But we have to layer in."
Ben Hutton: This is a both/and thing. Yeah. Mm-hmm. Like, we, we can't be really great at all this human [00:29:00] perspective stuff and then suck at being a contractor or- Right, right
a designer. Yeah, you gotta, you gotta- Like, the business doesn't work anymore. It, it's both. You gotta build good buildings. Right? Yeah. And so, back in health, I mean, we have to have the little H health with the big H too. Yeah. Yeah. Like, it- Yeah ... it has to be both. It's, it's not one or the other.
Yeah. Right. You gotta have both. Yeah.
Susan Kang: A- and having great big H health helps the little- Yep ... little H health. For sure. Right? I mean, this is- Yeah. I, I think, you know, they're, they're healthier. Yeah. They wanna come to work. Yeah. There's less absenteeism, less presenteeism. And I love the holistic approach that you take, right?
So the whole person, not just the person who just shows up, not just the work Ben or work Susan or work Ed, right? Yeah. I mean, this is, you know, we're more than just our- ourselves at work. Yeah. And I, that, I love that approach, and I think that's really helpful.
Ed O'Malley: B- Ben, you used the term both/and a minute ago, and I'd love for you just to flesh that out a little bit 'cause I think this chapter is, is kind of asking people to do a lot of, you know, quote, unquote, both/and things.
It's, it's [00:30:00] saying that, yes, like, you can be an advocate for your preferred strategy to improve health, whatever that might be, and you can understand we need to find alignment with people who have other preferred strategies, you know? And I, and I think leadership is, is often a lot about, like, standing in the ambiguity of being clear in what you believe- Mm-hmm
but also understanding just being clear about you, on what you believe isn't enough. You have to connect with others. You have to... So there's a kind of a we have to do both those things. From just a, a, a leadership perspective i- in general- I see you as somebody who I think whether you consciously do it or it's subconscious, you embody that ability to kind of hold two things or multiple things at the same time a- and not feel overly defined by any one of them.
And I'd love to, to just hear you riff on that. Is ... I'm not really sure- Yeah ... what question I'm asking, but, Yeah ... does it make sense to you?
Ben Hutton: [00:31:00] Well, first I think I I don't think I or any leader has a monopoly on great ideas. And so- I wanna recognize that I don't have a full- the full perspective on any issue in front of my business or in, in front of- our state. And so while I may have a viewpoint that's informed by all of the 30 years of history I have in business and growing up here I don't get it all. And so I have to be open to- hearing other people's ideas. I think the other thing is we have to recognize that we can both be right sometimes.
Yes ... it's, it's, it's- not a competition of- I get to win and Ed has to lose for me to win. Yeah. Both of these ideas or concepts or beliefs can, can be correct and right especially on a problem as big as health, in a state with millions of people. Like, there are gonna be different strategies that work with different populations in different parts of our state, and giving the freedom and opportunity for [00:32:00] leaders that are close to those issues or close to those people to advocate for them I think is a leader's job, is my job- And everybody's. Yeah. So.
Ed O'Malley: We, we say several times in this book, like, to lead the nation in health, it, it's gonna take some really great conservative ideas and some really great- Yeah ... progressive ideas- Mm-hmm ... and a whole bunch of ideas in the middle, and, and, like, understanding that intellectually, which I think is, is basically a truth.
Like, it's- Yeah ... gonna require that, doesn't mean that we can't also then have our preferred things that we're advocating for. So a lot, a lot of good stuff, a lot of good stuff.
Ben Hutton: I, I think one of the tragedies that I've observed happen in our nation and it's true in Kansas over the last decade or so, is that we have moved largely, I think, away from advocating for my ideas to advocating- against the ideas of my- Mm
political enemies. Mm. Mm. And [00:33:00] so we've formed these tribes, and if it doesn't matter how great your idea is, I can't be for it because then it would risk my identity as par- part of the tribe that I'm in. And I think that's a horrible place- Yeah, yeah ... uh, for our society to be in. We need to be for things.
Susan Kang: Yeah. So- I mean, that's built-in resistance. You know?
Ed O'Malley: A- a- and, Susan, I know we probably have one more question we wanna sneak in before we have to end, but I do wanna just riff on that for a second. I think in some ways what we're trying to do... I love that, Ben, you just said instead of advocating for our ideas, we're advocating against other people's ideas.
Mm-hmm. And I think one thing we're trying to do in this book, and we touch on in this chapter, is in essence say we actually need the 30,000 to go a step further and say, we need you to advocate for the centering of this problem or opportunity. I think it's an opportunity to lead the nation in health.
When Kansas leads the nation in health, it's gonna help everything in Kansas. Mm. Mm. Like, it's gonna help our economy. Sure. Our research has shown that. It's gonna help all kinds of things. But [00:34:00] it's, like, how do we, like, we ha- center the, center the problem, like, advocate for the problem getting attention, you know?
Yeah. A- and- Number one, yeah ... a- and I think what I've- Start there ... found is when we get people talking in a healthy way together about a daunting challenge, they usually end up finding common ground. Yeah. But if they start, like, they're not talking about the problem, they're talking about their i- their, their, th- what they don't like about your ideas- Mm-hmm
right? There, there's not the opportunity to find some common ground. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. And I love the way you framed that. Like, we gotta get beyond arguing against other people's ideas.
Susan Kang: Ben, we were talking about the differences between strategies and goals.
How do you find or help people to identify the common goal- to get their work done?
Ben Hutton: So, so I think goals are really important because they provide the North Star that everybody can look to periodically for guidance and make sure [00:35:00] we're all tracking in the right direction. Strategies is where I do think we have to provide more freedom for experimentation- tying back to- what we said earlier. So like in our organization we set some really big long-term high-level goals, and then we provide a lot of freedom to teams within our company to come up with strategies every quarter, every year to go and try. And then all of that information and data gets fed back to the company at large so that in the next iteration people can play off of that or adopt what worked or ignore what didn't.
And so I think we need to be rigid and explicit with goals. Our goals should not be something that is changing. But our strategies, I think, have to change and adapt with the learning that comes with trying and implementing them.
Ed O'Malley: An amazing conversation. Ben, it's our first one with you. You'll be back, I believe, for a couple other chapters. I think next time we'll see you is when we're talking about chapter 18- Yep
[00:36:00] which is about embracing bold vision. I can't wait for that. But to close out this episode, Susan, you usually want us to end with a key takeaway.
Susan Kang: So actually, what I love, my takeaway here is two people can be right at the same time, and I think that I'm gonna be thinking about that for a long time, Ben, and I encourage our listeners to actually think about this. I mean, are you, are you arguing for your position or, you know, positing your position, or are you, are you argu- arguing for someone el- against someone else's position?
So I mean, that's my takeaway.
Ben Hutton: I like that one. The takeaway that I would have would be a little bit of a spin on something I said earlier in terms of experiments. I think sometimes we need to wait for permission and enroll a lot of people in our visions and ideas and strategies, and other times we don't need to wait for permission to try something cool or great- Mm.
Mm ... that may have a tremendous impact. And so, a leadership [00:37:00] skill to know when, when is the right strategy. But I think in the private sector especially more often than not, small, fast, quick experiments that give us information are a route we should be exploring more.
Susan Kang: Mm.
Ed O'Malley: I love it. Yeah. A lot of things on my mind. The thing I wanna end with is just calling back to, Ben, something you said, that you think a key part of your role is to help people focus on the right problems. And so for members of the 30,000 who are listening, maybe you're a city council member, maybe you're a school board member, maybe you're a nonprofit executive, community-minded business person, you might just think about when you're advocating for something in community life and civic life, are you advocating for your preferred solution to what you think is one of the right problems, or are you using your authority to advocate for helping people focus on the right problems?
Mm. Those are two big differences. Mm. Ben, thanks for [00:38:00] illuminating that for us and for our listeners. It's been a great conversation. Our next episode, we'll dive into chapter eight, and Kenny Wilk from the University of Kansas Health System will be back with us to explore how our existing ex- assumptions often get in our own way.
Thanks, everybody. We'll see you next time.