Up & Comers - 2009

Who will be running the healthcare systems of the future? Perhaps many of the 12 recipients of Modern Healthcare’s 23rd annual Up & Comers recognition program. The award, which drew a near-record 139 nominees, honors rising young stars in the healthcare management field.
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In late 2006, Peter Bergmann's career brought him home to Buffalo, N.Y. A little more than two years later, a promotion put him at the helm of the hospital where his mother worked as an anesthesiologist for 23 years. As a native, Bergmann, 38, can (and does) speak frankly, and with affection, of winters in western New York and it was his insider's knowledge that convinced one doctor he would be “uniquely suited” to meet the healthcare and market challenges facing Sisters of Charity Hospital when Buffalo's Catholic Health System sought a new chief executive for the teaching...
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When Damond Boatwright took the job as CEO of Lee's Summit (Mo.) Medical Center, he was fulfilling a long-term goal. Whether that goal relates to his career plan or the barbecue that Kansas City is famous for is open to question.
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When Stephanie Conners became chief nursing officer at Hahnemann University Hospital in 2004, the downtown Philadelphia provider had too many vacant nursing jobs and was spending too much money on costly contract labor.
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George Gaston understands the important role healthcare workers play in the lives of patients and their families. That's because Gaston has been on the receiving end of patient care, an experience the 38-year-old says changed him as a leader.
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For many, one's career is decided during college. Barbara Walczyk Joers has known what she wanted to do since her childhood. After having ear surgery for impaired hearing when she was just 5 years old, a career in healthcare became her lifetime goal. She participated in health organizations and activities while in high school and college, determined to make her dreams a reality.
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If Catholic Health Initiatives was in search of a fresh perspective to help turn around its tiny, financially troubled facility Albany (Minn.) Area Hospital and Medical Center, the provider no doubt received that in the form of Ben Koppelman. The hospital executive was just 22 and fresh out of college when he was hired in 1995 as administrator of the 17-bed, critical-access hospital.
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J. Michael Kramer brought an abundance of training, skills and passion to Trinity Health. He joined the Novi, Mich.-based system in August 2005 when he was named vice president and chief medical information officer, a newly created position at the time.
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Since becoming president and CEO of Carolinas Medical Center-Union in Monroe, N.C., Michael Lutes has made it apparent when his employees are happy, hospital productivity and employee satisfaction increases.
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Julie Norton had a perfect 4.0 grade-point average with a double major in accounting and math at the University of South Dakota, but—compared with implementing an electronic health-record system “built from scratch”—making straight A's was achieved with very little pressure.
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As a college football player in 1992, Clarence Sevillian caught passes totaling 222 yards in a single game as a receiver for Vanderbilt University, a school record he held until 2007.
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Like many Chicagoland natives, Douglas Winkelhake is a diehard Cubs fan, a feeling he was able to transfer to his eldest son. His younger, more rebellious son became a fan of the Chicago baseball team's archrival, the St. Louis Cardinals—something sure to strike the heart of a Cubs fan. But Winkelhake is able to laugh it off.
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Sometimes in life, you have to take risks. That's what Kamille Wright told herself four years ago, when at age 36 she left a secure job at Kings County Hospital Center, New York, to work for one of the most troubled hospitals in the nation: Martin Luther King/Drew Medical Center in Los Angeles.
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Modern Healthcare issued a call for nominations for its 23rd annual Up & Comers recognition program on May 4 and ran a series of advertisements soliciting nominations through the July 3 submission deadline. This year, we received 139 nominations, up from last year's 134 nominations. An editorial review board composed of the magazine's senior editors reviewed the nominations and selected the 12 recipients.
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