Silver Cross taps chief strategy officer as new CEO

Silver Cross Hospital, one of the few independent hospitals left in the Chicago area, has tapped its chief strategy officer to be CEO, effective Oct. 1.

Ruth Colby, who also is a senior vice president at the hospital in southwest suburban New Lenox, succeeds retiring longtime chief Paul Pawlak. He's among a small club of executives leaving their posts, and hospital boards are preparing for another wave of retirements in the years to come.

"Ruth was selected because of her successful leadership track record at Silver Cross in combination with her proven strategic abilities that have been instrumental in effectively positioning the hospital for growth in a fast changing healthcare market," Douglas Hutchison Jr., chairman of the Silver Cross board of directors, said in a statement.

Colby will be one of the few female hospital CEOs in the Chicago area. She'll take the helm during a dizzying time for health care leaders, who are bracing for potentially tumultuous change under the Trump administration.

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-Will Silver Cross be wooed when longtime CEO departs?-Few women in hospital C-suite"We have an extremely strong foundation thanks to Paul, our Board, and our extraordinary employees, physicians and volunteers," Colby said in the statement. "I look forward to continuing to advance these strengths and ensure Silver Cross remains a treasured asset to our community and to the patients we are privileged to serve."

Colby joined Silver Cross in 2005. Under her leadership, she forged partnerships with prominent facilities to grow the Silver Cross brand and bring academic medicine to patients roughly 40 miles from the Loop. Those partners include the Shirley Ryan AbilityLab (formerly the Rehabilitation Institute of Chicago), Ann & Robert H. Lurie Children's Hospital of Chicago, University of Chicago Medicine and Northwestern Medicine. She also hatched an affiliation with Advocate Health Care, the largest hospital network in the state.

Colby earned a bachelor's degree from Northwestern University, a master's degree from New York University and a MBA from the University of Chicago. Previously, Colby held leadership roles at U of C Medicine and Solucient, which is now Truven Health Analytics.

"Silver Cross taps chief strategy officer as new CEO" originally appeared in Crain's Chicago Business.