Working with your reputation

By ASHLEY CAMPBELL

Reputation, says Dr Ian McPherson, is the most important asset any business or individual can have. A good reputation gets you noticed, makes you trusted, opens doors and takes you places you could never otherwise go.

The International Red Cross, for which he worked for three years, is a good example. McPherson joined the aid organisation in 1982 as a way of "expanding my medical horizons and practising my craft in a place where there was significant need".

What drew him to the Red Cross, rather than any other organisation, was its reputation.

"One of the reasons the Red Cross gets into places around the world that even the United Nations can't get into is its reputation. And it guards that reputation jealously.

"My reputation as an individual is what will carry me through in life, and you can't compromise that."

But he acknowledges that in the turmoil created by disputed fixed-price contracts for private healthcare providers, computer-generated claims-processing chaos and the introduction of annual age banding for premiums, the reputation of the organisation he joined last June was compromised.

Members were unhappy, staff were unhappy, specialists and private hospitals were unhappy, the chief executive and chairman both resigned, its credit rating was downgraded and the media was having a field day.

His job, to restore stability internally and reputation externally, was not for the faint-hearted.

So how has he gone about doing so? Quietly, it seems. Until last week, when an independent report backed up its decision to move to age-banded premiums, Southern Cross had dropped off the media and public radar screens.

Previously disgruntled members contacted by the Herald had little, if anything, to say about their health insurer 14 months after the height of the storm.

One said there had been no change in service levels either positive or negative; another said service had improved markedly and "the people that we deal with are so much more relaxed". Two were not even aware there had been a change of CEO

And that, says Andrea Petett, executive director of the Health Funds Association, says a lot about McPherson's approach.

"Ian, quite purposely I think, has kept a low profile not to derail things. I think that's his personality - quietly and steadily to build and grow relationships."

Among the relationships that Southern Cross needed to pay attention to were those with medical specialists and private hospitals. The signs are encouraging.

"Compared with his predecessor [Roger Bowie], he has a more collaborative and consultative style," says Andrew Blair, president of the New Zealand Private Hospitals Association.

"I'm finding him easy to engage and deal with - that's got to be a positive."

That engaging manner will, says Blair, go a long way to restoring trust in Southern Cross. But when asked if that trust is yet restored, the answer is an emphatic no. Healthcare providers want to see tangible results from the changed management style, and are concerned that the friendly society may still be concentrating on driving down costs rather than growing the private health sector.

McPherson acknowledges that in working to fully understand what he calls "a complex organisation" he hasn't spent as much time on relationship-building as he would like, not least because "stabilising the organisation was the first objective the board gave me when I arrived".

Yet it is clear that rebuilding relationships is a crucial task. As Blair indicated, the management style of McPherson's predecessor was one factor contributing to the mess Southern Cross got itself into.

In media reports of the time, Bowie was variously described as "hard-nosed", a "big-picture man" and a "strategic thinker".

Ask McPherson to describe his management style and he'll tell you he's a people person, "an intuitive person" and "I think I'm a nice person as well, and I think that's quite important".

It should not be surprising he perceives himself - and is perceived by others - this way, given his route into management via humanitarian work in conflict zones on the Afghanistan-Pakistan and Cambodia-Thailand borders.

Originally working as an anaesthetist for the Red Cross, McPherson found he was being steered into medical management.

Then came the week he worked with the United Nations to move a town of 70,000 people across the border to where they could no longer be shelled.

"We did that over a 48-hour period. That was one of those career-defining moments that said to me 'if you want to help your fellow man, you don't get many opportunities to help as many of them at one time as I just did then'.

"The fact that you could improve the health and lives of a lot of people by being involved in management was a revelation."

Although he's now working in the private sector, it's clear that McPherson is still driven by a desire to help as much as he is by any intellectual or commercial challenge.

His driving belief is that the public health sector, while crucial, will never be able to offer New Zealanders all the services they might want - even if it does a superb job of offering what they need in a crisis. That leaves a gap that only the private sector can fill.

"I certainly see this as the peak of my career," he says.

"This is the most exciting opportunity so far, because it is so important for New Zealand. It is so important that we get the private health sector right."

You can bet that his professional reputation - and that of Southern Cross - will depend on it.

Ian McPherson's CV

Title: Group CEO, Southern Cross Healthcare

Age: 53

Place of birth: Masterton

Qualifications: Medical doctor with obstetrics diploma

Major posts: Medical co-ordinator International Red Cross; general manager Thames Hospital Board; CEO Bay of Plenty Area Health Board; CEO, National Interim Provider Board; executive director health insurer Aetna New Zealand; regional general manager health (Asia and Pacific) insurer Allianz

Home situation: Married, six children aged 10 to 26

Personal interests: Tennis, armchair rugby and league, backgammon, family