Iowa Specialty Hospital

Notes from Steve

March 26, 2015

I get asked, “Did you have a great weekend?” on Mondays a lot.  “No, not especially,” is my honest and truthful answer.  I’m not sure what I am missing here but it seems like people are having the times of their lives from 6PM on Friday to 6AM on Monday.  I’ve asked around to see exactly what I am missing – are there huge parties or spectacles that people forgot to tell me about?  It’s as if I am supposed to have amazing awe-inspiring stories that take one’s breath away every Monday morning.  (… somewhat long pause …)  Well, I don’t.
 
I think we in 2015 feel that our lives should look like a TV show.  A reality show where people are hollering all the time and sometimes a table gets knocked over.  (And we’d all sit on one side of the table at dinner.  And our servant Alice would serve us pork chops and applesauce … to which, I always wondered, “What starch was served?”).  In all actuality, life in northern Iowa in March is kind of boring.  Sure, we have the high holy days (St. Paddy’s and March Madness) but really, how often do we drink the green beer and carouse like we did when we were young?  It took a lot of years for me to figure out that a great weekend may be just reading a good book or having a great run outside.
 
When we point to success we probably should reflect on what that looks like.  At Iowa Specialty Hospital, success should look more like a patient with an awesome outcome and a feeling of being loved and cared for by a great group of people.  It’s not about awards or accolades.  We get noticed quite a bit in the paper and in magazines but if I were a patient, it wouldn’t matter if the CEO was named in some magazine … what would matter is that I, as a patient, had really awesome care.
 
At the end of the day I want to look back and judge my life less on the glitz and glamour and more on the lack of drama in my life.  I want to reflect on my journey and know that I left great things in my wake.  If that means that I didn’t have huge blowouts every weekend, that’s fine.  
 

Steve Simonin, President & CEO 
 

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