Saint Francis CEO Bjelich to retire Sept. 1; Reese chosen to be next leader, pending approval

Steven C. Bjelich, president and CEO of Saint Francis Healthcare System, will retire Sept. 1.

Maryann Reese, Saint Francis’ executive vice president and chief operating officer, is set to replace Bjelich, pending approval from the Most Rev. Edward Matthew Rice, bishop of the Diocese of Springfield-Cape Girardeau.

Bjelich, who has led Saint Francis since 1999, was instrumental in renovations to the medical center, which includes the $23.7 million medically integrated fitness center and an emergency department that was expanded threefold.

Under Bjelich, Saint Francis built a dedicated heart hospital and cancer institute that opened in 2011 and a $127 million patient tower with all private rooms.

Saint Francis Healthcare System board chairman Don Kaverman said Friday that Bjelich has exhibited outstanding leadership skills during his 18-year tenure.

“He’s very competitive, and that probably has something to do with his athletic background,” he said, referring to Bjelich’s stint as an All-American quarter-mile runner at Indiana University.

Bjelich said Friday that’s probably true.

“Both my parents were coaches,” Bjelich said. “I’ve taken that discipline and that competitiveness and applied it to my profession throughout my 39 years of senior management now.”

“He expects a lot,” Kaverman said of Bjelich. “He sets the bar high, but he enables the people who work with him to rise up and to meet those expectations. He empowers everyone around him to achieve at levels they probably never thought they could achieve.”

Kaverman called Bjelich a visionary, as did the Missouri Hospital Association when it honored him with its Visionary Leadership Award and its highest honor, the Distinguished

Service Award.

“When I first came to Saint Francis Medical Center at the time in 1999, we were not in a real good place on a variety of fronts,” Bjelich said. “We were not strong financially; we had only 40 percent market share; the relationship with physicians was not healthy; the relationship with employees was not terribly healthy, either.”

Since then, he said Saint Francis has grown its staff from about 1,100 to 3,000 employees and has been named among the top 100 best places to work in the health-care industry for the past six years by Modern Healthcare magazine.

Bjelich led the effort to bring back obstetrics to Saint Francis in 2001 after more than 30 years, and he led the development of Saint Francis’ Neonatal Intensive Care Unit, which has since been renovated three times to expand its treatment capabilities.

Saint Francis enjoys AA- and A+ bond ratings from Fitch and Standard & Poor, respectively.

“It’s just been remarkable growth,” he said.

That growth has extended to communities outside Cape Girardeau through the Saint Francis Medical Partners network, which Bjelich developed and includes more than 200 physicians in five states.

But for Bjelich, the standout statistic is market share.

“Personally, my greatest accomplishment, if you can call it mine, is the relationships I’ve built with our physicians, with our employees that have allowed us to grow [our] market share from 40 percent to north of 58 percent market share,” he said. “That is huge.”

Bjelich also negotiated affiliations with MD Anderson Cancer Center and the Cleveland Clinic.

Kaverman said Bjelich’s time with Saint Francis has been remarkable for its length as well as its accomplishments.

“Eighteen years is not typical tenure for a senior health-care executive, especially a CEO,” he said.

Bjelich said he knows he’s an outlier in that respect.

“According to the American College of Healthcare Executives, the average turnover of a CEO is 3 1/2 years. Before I came to Saint Francis, I was about the fourth CEO in a seven-year period. It is unusual to be in one locale for 18 years,” he said. “What has maintained my excitement and enthusiasm is our employees, our physicians and aspects of community.”

Bjelich established a program by which employees can earn more by working to improve service as measured by specific metrics.

Through that program, employees have earned almost $79.5 million overall in bonus pay.

“At Saint Francis, we really are a family,” he said of his employees.

He said that sense of family will be hard to give up, but he said he’s more excited to spend more time with his actual family in retirement.

“Health care and the role of the CEO is a challenging but very, very rewarding position,” he said. “I have a daughter who is following the same footsteps in health care. ... It’s amazing, because you are in a position to touch lives, not as a direct caregiver like our nurses so wonderfully do or our physicians, but to create the environment to touch lives.

“Now as I enter retirement, I look forward to playing golf; I look forward to continue enjoying wines and travel, but more importantly spend time with my wife, who has given up so much because I’m usually at the hospital or out at one of our clinical sites, but that’s just part of the role ... part of the enthusiasm I have for my profession. I still have that passion; there’s no question of that, and there won’t be any letting up until well after September, believe me.”

Kaverman said choosing Bjelich’s replacement began when filling the chief operating officer position in 2015. Maryann Reese, he said, was chosen in part for her potential to fill Bjelich’s role eventually.

“That was really a no-brainer for the board,” he said. “We had the person in place who we felt was going to be our next leader.”

Reese previously served as CEO of St. Elizabeth’s Hospital in Belleville, Illinois, which is about 40 beds larger than Saint Francis Medical Center.

Reese has more than 15 years of experience in health-care executive leadership, mostly in Catholic hospitals, and Kaverman called her “extremely talented.”

“This appointment represents a continuation of the great work started by Steve,” Kaverman said. “We wish he and Lisa the happiest of retirements and thank them both for their commitment to our community.”

“It really has been a blessing to be a part of this organization and a privilege to be a part of it,” Bjelich said. “And for that, I’ll always be thankful.”

tgraef@semissourian.com

(573) 388-3627