In this episode of the Healthcare Leadership Excellence Podcast, I welcome Todd Holzman, founder of Holzman Leadership, a consultancy that focuses on leadership development in industries like pharma, biotech, and finance. Todd brings a wealth of knowledge on building effective leaders—a skill that’s often underdeveloped in healthcare, where technical training tends to take priority over leadership skills.

Todd shares his philosophy of "leaders building leaders," which is especially relevant for many new healthcare leaders who find themselves leading teams without much guidance. He explains that leadership is about mobilizing people to tackle problems and make the world better, an idea inspired by his work with professors at Harvard’s Kennedy School. For Todd, leadership is not just about managing tasks but empowering people to achieve their best, both within and beyond their official roles.

A key takeaway from our conversation is Todd’s advice on setting clear expectations and holding regular, collaborative performance discussions. He suggests that leaders check in with their teams regularly to ensure everyone is aligned with evolving role demands, especially as the healthcare field has faced rapid changes since COVID-19. Todd believes that by assessing development areas and creating open channels for feedback, leaders can help their teams grow and deliver better patient outcomes.

We also dive into some of the major challenges leaders face, like handling conflict and solving complex problems. Todd talks about feeling overwhelmed and advises leaders to make problem-solving a team effort. He shares his “real work process,” a method that starts by clarifying the problem, gathering relevant data, and understanding what’s at stake—all before jumping to solutions.

Toward the end, Todd offers insight into why so many change efforts fail. He says that leaders often skip the essential step of building agreement on the problem itself, leading to weak buy-in and limited impact. By focusing on gaining consensus early on, Todd believes leaders can create more meaningful, lasting change.

Check out more episodes here.

👉 Who is Karl Pister?
👉 Follow us on LinkedIn.
👉 Have access to leadership materials that will level up your game.
👉 Contact us on our website.

Ready to level up your leadership skills? Sign up for The Coaching Group's leadership courses.