Q&A with Tom Andriola, Part 2: “We’ve adopted almost a wartime mentality.”

As technology becomes more strategic to the mission of an organization — especially in the areas of research, education, and patient care — information technology needs to be represented at the cabinet level. In fact, discussions about data-driven innovations that can transform care delivery must involve CIOs from the start, said Tom Andriola. That was precisely the thinking at UC Irvine, where last fall he was named Vice Chancellor of IT and Data, after having served as CIO for both UC Irvine Health and the University of California system for six years. Now, the CIOs of UC’s six health systems report up to Andriola, who likens his role to that of a conductor whose focus is to “get the band to play together,” even though they have their own instruments.

Never has it been so important for the different sections of UC Health to harmonize than in the past few weeks, as the organization has banded together to create and implement a COVID-19 response. During a recent interview, Andriola talked about how the “dynamic environment” has shifted his priorities, why he believes virtual care should become “the new norm,” and the incredible opportunity organizations have to help educate the community.

Part 1

Part 2



* Adopting a “wartime mentality”

* Daily huddles to manage the “dynamic environment”

* Dramatic increase in remote workers – “It’s created some instability.”

* COVID-19’s long-term impact on care delivery

* Cybersecurity concerns – “It’s easy not think about it.”

* Sharing knowledge throughout UC’s network through “a combination of technology & human coordination.”

* His role as “Impresario” for the 6 CIOs



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Bold Statements

The fact that there is so much dynamic information requires us as leaders to really have that daily huddle type of approach, which we’re now doing twice a day, just so we can deal with the broad implications of this.

In a lot of cases, especially in healthcare, where we’re trying to do a better job of matching the right model of care for the right patient in the right situation, and move that to the lowest cost care interaction, we may find that this new norm can create a more effective healthcare system.

We’ve been trying to think about that — when we take steps to do things, to stop and say, have we thought through the cyber implications of this? Have we thought about that it’s going to force us to open new ports and that may make us more vulnerable? Is there something in the messaging around this that the bad actors out there may take advantage of with phishing campaigns?

Being able to connect and share information — ‘We just saw this, everyone else should be aware of this’ — can really shorten the time span between when we recognize something and when we’re able to respond to something. That’s been a huge focus of our cyber risk program over the last four years.

We’re sharing those because it helps everyone think about what we could be putting together to show our executive team to give them a comfort level that we’re doing the right things.

Gamble:  From the leadership standpoint, this situation presents a challenge for leaders who are trying to manage their staff appropriately. I feel like that ability to think on the fly — and that might not be the right expression — highlights some of the really important criteria of leaders, especially in this industry.