Marc Probst, vice president and CIO of the Salt Lake City, Utah-based Intermountain Healthcare, has been recognized by two leading industry associations—the College of Healthcare Information Management Executives (CHIME) and the Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society (HIMSS)—as the 2019 John E. Gall Jr. CIO of the Year.
The award is given annually to a CIO who has shown significant leadership and commitment to the healthcare industry during his or her career. The recipient is selected jointly by the boards of CHIME and HIMSS. Last year’s winner was Ed Kopetsky, CIO of Lucile Packard Children’s Hospital Stanford and Stanford Children’s Health.
According to CHIME and HIMSS officials, for more than 30 years, Probst has been at the forefront of change in the healthcare IT industry. “First as a partner with two large professional service organizations and later as CIO at Intermountain Healthcare, he has inspired those around him to think strategically and act boldly to improve health and care.”
Officials pointed out that when the federal government wanted a thought leader to help establish a policy framework, they selected Probst in 2009 to serve on the Federal Health IT Policy Committee, which helped develop health IT policies for the government. And when CHIME was poised for transformation and growth, the association’s members tuned to Probst to provide the vision and guidance. Indeed, Probst now serves on the CHIME Innovation Advisory Board. He previously served as chair of the CHIME Board of Trustees in 2016, chair of the CHIME Foundation Board in 2017 and chair of CHIME’s Public Policy Steering Committee in 2017.
CHIME President and CEO Russell Branzell said in a statement, “Marc has contributed to our community in countless ways. He has been instrumental in CHIME’s growth, domestically and internationally. Marc taught at our very first program in India and continues to be an ambassador for CHIME around the world. He piloted our first innovation initiative and helped make Intermountain the home for CHIME Innovation. The list goes on and on, and he has done this all while running a spectacular digital enterprise at Intermountain.”
HIMSS President and CEO Hal Wolf added, “Marc has been a transformation leader blazing the trail in advancing technology to improve health and care. His work exemplifies what it means to be a changemaker – an innovator who rigorously challenges the status quo and empowers others to follow suit in the journey to providing better health for everyone, everywhere.”
In an exclusive interview with Healthcare Innovation last year at the HIMSS19 conference, Probst, when asked what leadership advice he’d give his fellow CIOs, said he’s fortunate to work for an organization that’s sophisticated and likes technology. “You have to push the limits on that,” he emphasized. “My advice for those not as evolved would be to stick with it. Always provide reliable, secure, and fast information systems. The core of what we do isn’t changing. We have pushed innovation; now, we have to push the boundaries on what [more] we can do,” he said.
Probst will be honored on March 9 at the 2020 CHIME-HIMSS CIO Forum in Orlando, Fla. The official awards presentation will take place March 11 as part of HIMSS20 in Orlando.
