Inter-blog promotion

Yesterday, Paul Levy, CEO of Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, visited one of my classes...not so much to talk about his hospital as to talk about his blog. He gained at least one regular reader from the day -- me.

Levy said he started the blog in 2005 "on a lark, really," after reading an article mentioning that, of all of the Fortune 500 companies' CEOs, only one kept a blog. Levy said, "I thought, 'I'm a CEO. I run what I think is a very worthwhile organization. I can do that.'"

And so was born Running a Hospital, Levy's daily musings on his job, the health care industry, and the goings-on at BIDMC. As time went by, he began to add commentary on life in general: his experiences as a youth soccer coach, his family and his interests, including Red Sox baseball, of which BIDMC is proud to be "the official hospital." When he sees a charity that he finds interesting, or an artist whose work he enjoys, he will promote it on his blog as well, "so it became a community service in that way."

While Levy admitted to knowing almost nothing about blogging at first, he has developed his skills and built up an impressive readership in two years. His blog has become an unfiltered and honest source of news and publicity for BIDMC, as his posts are not seen or edited by anyone in the hospital's communications department before being published.

Levy is proud to say that his hospital is open and honest with the press. "I never want to see a story saying, 'Levy was unavailable for comment,'" he said. "If a story is newsworthy enough to be written about, I want our opinion in it. If you ask the Boston press, they would probably say that of all the hospitals, we are the best at that." Occasionally, he noted, he even beats the press to a story.

When our class ended, the person sitting next to me wondered aloud "what was the point of that?" but frankly, I Levy was the first of the five speakers we've had that was truly interesting to me. Probably because I have worked in health care before and would love to make a career of it in the future, I found him fascinating.

Levy clearly enjoys his job and enjoys blogging about it. Readers nation- and even worldwide check in with him daily, and from now on, I will, too.