I’m not a big one to celebrate anniversaries (maybe that’s why I have an EX-husband) but this May will be a year since I walked away from a career in hospitals to join the staff at Healthcare Informatics. Every day I thank whatever serendipitous angel landed me here on Fifth Avenue (much as I loved the South Bronx, for real.) And as we put together our current June issue, the HCI 100, it’s a daily reminder of why I know I made the right choice.
A year ago, brand new to the publishing industry, this magazine’s staff were busy doing what they’re doing right now—putting together HCI 100, the year’s biggest issue. What did I know about the HCI 100? Not much more than your average reader (OK, I actually used to read HCI before working here.) So, for myself, I did a little research. Surprise! I found some commentary online, from readers posting elsewhere, about how irrelevant our signature issue had become. In particular, the “dead trees issue” moniker stung pretty bad (Green Daphne). Here’s where it gets interesting:
I brought all the stuff I had found straight to my new boss, Anthony Guerra. You might think only a fool would do that so early in the game, but hey. This was either the right place to work or it wasn’t, and I figured the sooner I found out, the better. What happened? Not only did Anthony listen, he brought the rest of the team in on the comments. And based on what I had brought to his attention, a dialogue opened, and the entire survey was revamped in order to address the issues. The questions were re-written, the focus was refined, some things were deleted, and Anthony even brought people in to gather important missing data. This year, it’s an HCI 100 that will have a lot more meaning for our readers. More importantly, for me anyway, it’s concrete proof that I made the right decision by coming to HCI. We’re really proud of everything we do here, and of the contribution we make to the industry. And I’m proud to say I’m part of this class act.
