Client Testimonials

“You have had an enormous impact in helping me develop my leadership capacity. Your perspectives have brought **critical insight into senior leadership decision-making**.  Your conflict resolution skills in difficult negotiations at the highest company levels have been superb.  You have a spectacular skill set and your guidance is priceless.”

Dr. Fisher consistently enables high-level business impact and personal achievement, as demonstrated by the following references from clients:

“Robert is the best in the business.”

“I view Dr. Fisher’s coaching as **a true turn-around talent**.  His observations and opinions are insightful and his ability to translate this into sustained actions is key to the success of these assignments.  We are thrilled with his work and I would recommend him for the most challenging assignments.”

"I hired Dr. Robert Fisher to provide leadership development to US Oncology's Executive Directors in Texas to expand their mastery over their roles, and to extend their individual leadership capacity.

Execution Strategy:

Dr. Fisher and I met regularly to plot the course of this initiative, gauge progress, target key outcomes with each executive and articulate the path that each executive needed to take, some through critical and challenging times. Robert worked with the Executive Directors to best execute our key initiatives and he advised them on managing key relationships with physician leaders. In three-way meetings with Executive Directors and senior physician leaders he helped direct and guide them to more effectively lead their respective areas of responsibility. He worked with them on presentation skills and speech delivery to their various audiences.

Dr. Fisher identified known and unrecognized challenges and issues facing each Executive Director and helped them form strategies to address them. During his work with the Executive Directors responsible for revenue cycle operations, he initiated trips into the field to a number of Texas locations and observed encounters between patients and practice financial representatives. Based on these observations and the questions he posed to the representatives, he wrote scripting for language and behavior to guide them to a new approach. The revenue cycle department integrated its technical guidelines into his work and this integrated system rolled out across the state. This new approach created enhanced relationships with patients, expanded information gathering, and increased revenue from clients throughout Texas Oncology. We anticipate that this will make a significant improvement in effectiveness of patient financial encounters and in revenue cycle cost efficiency.

Outcome:

Dr. Fisher's work contributed substantially and immediately to organizational success through:

• Excellent developmental outcomes with Executive Directors,

• Leverage of skills and relationships with the physicians, and

• Revenue cycle enhancement.

For me as CEO I have found Robert to be a trusted advisor and brainstormer of ideas. Robert plays the role of a silent partner, and a thoughtful sounding board as I progress myself and the company. The role of CEO can be a lonely job. With Dr. Fisher present, it is less so.

He has worked with my leadership team and key employees on both professional and personal development. He has worked with the customer facing teams to improve their communication to be more direct and explicit in their choice of words and phrasing.

As Robert doesn't work within the company on a day to day basis he provides a unique, non-biased and external perspective to ideating. He brings an authentic caring approach and loyalty to the company with commitment to our success as strong as any employee and he is keenly committed to its welfare and savvy about its development. I'm constantly hearing positive feedback from members of the team who work with Robert and they're genuinely grateful that the company is investing in their success through his assistance. I've found investing proactively in key staff development with Robert not only improves their performance but gains greater commitment and loyalty to the company.

Cheers,

**You provided the leadership for the high morale with which we look forward to the merger.** You built and executed a plan that helped us deal with conflicts of nearly every conceivable form. You guided us in several important relationships resulting in substantial new revenue.”

Your contribution to my success has proven **immensely valuable to my clients, our firm and me personally.** I am currently leading an effort to integrate the supply chains of three recently merged companies.  The scope is enormous: a $40 billion global organization of 60,000 people with three distinct cultures. As a result of your advising on leadership, problem resolution and delivering difficult messages, this effort is proceeding smoothly and with relative ease, despite its complexity and scope.”

I engaged Robert to assist me with a cultural change with my International Finance Group at Visa International when I was there in the role of EVP of International Finance. **Robert helped establish a workable model of trust with the staff, improve communication and team spirit** and create an environment where people felt more a part of creating solutions. Essentially, he strongly helped me jump start effective change to my finance group. I highly recommend him and look forward to working with him in the future.”

Dr. Robert Fisher’s assignment in working with senior leaders at Kaiser Permanente was daunting. The initial challenge was to find common experience and values to appeal to a very diverse group of regional presidents, physician executives, not for profit administrators, and for profit COOs of Kaiser Permanente.

After guiding us in building common vision and values, he then undertook individual leadership and organizational development work to help us enhance our operational and organizational effectiveness. In some cases this required substantial improvements in multiple disciplines. 

It is a measure of Dr. Fisher’s success and skill that not only did the several businesses experience dramatic improvements in sales, revenue, operational effectiveness and medical/administrative cooperation, but even those of us who were most resistant in the beginning, including myself,  became devoted to his highly successful strategies which created stronger leaders and sustained results. Robert is wise, patient, and persuasive and has a keen eye for business strategy and positioning.  

Dr. Fisher’s ability to work with senior leaders in health care is superb. 

I have been involved in healthcare and medical administration at a private not-for-profit academic medical center for twenty-five years. Six months ago, I was promoted to the position of Chief Medical Officer and Vice President of Medical Affairs.

I am not the typical hospital executive. I am opinionated- sometimes to a fault. I like to laugh and to make others laugh. Some like me, others don’t. I am not shy about entering difficult discussions and I have the usual M.D. bravado of thinking that my knowledge base knows no bounds. When first advised that I would have an executive coach as part of my new employment agreement as a Vice President, I assumed that this was the CEO’s way of trying to fit my personality into his perception of “acceptable executive behavior”.

In my new role, I was provided the services of Dr. Robert Fisher.  I have now worked with Dr. Robert Fisher for approximately six months. Our meetings have become a highlight of my employment. In addition, I have gained insights that certainly have improved my performance. In fact, I am not certain that I would stayed on the job without our interactions.

Dr. Fisher is smart, and he has a great sense of humor. He has a background and experience that allows comparisons to previous difficult situations. History is a great teacher. In addition, he is totally trustworthy. When we meet, I outline those situations that I believe are difficult. After twenty years of surviving hospital administration, I am no novice. However, he has helped me to understand that new challenges may require new approaches. He has helped me gain insight into the characters and needs of my fellow executives.. His insights lead to success. I can state with certainty that I gain immensely by reviewing potential new approaches to problems and people. I find myself effecting approaches that would not have come naturally.

I look forward to my meetings with Dr. Fisher. He is clearly a good person who cares about excellence. I know that he has had a huge positive influence on me in terms of adapting to a difficult new challenge.  He has my very highest recommendation.

In my role as Chief Clinical Safety Officer and Medical Director of Quality Management at Lucille Packard Children’s Hospital at Stanford I am called upon to assess and introduce change in practice to enhance care across multiple disciplines and often with speed, always with efficiency and with requisite acceptance.  This change must be sustained and measured.

The speed in which you were able to assess with me the issues facing my leadership and position and help institute a plan to ensure its rapid effectiveness was a great contribution.  You proceed with keen insight and seasoned effectiveness to help me accelerate the transformation into the leader that I must be in my role.  This amalgam of complex communication and assessment tools that you have helped me develop in addition to skills at conflict resolution and  negotiation have helped multiple initiatives succeed in a much shorter and easier path than I would have expected.  My insight into the strategy and organizational change has become an invaluable tool.

We are moving at an unprecedented rate of change resulting in improved and measurable change.  My abilities to chair a meeting, introduce complex and often challenging new ideas, institute them and work with peers and senior medical and administrative colleagues has strengthened to the advantage of my work and the quality of care in our institution as well as accelerate my contributions to the quality and safety on a national stage.

The work that I have accomplished with your assistance with outcomes recognized in our institution. It has caused true and critical change and has been measurable and sustained.  It is a credit to what we have done together.  It has contributed great and lasting value both to me as a leader and physician and to Lucille Packard Children’s Hospital as a whole.

Because I have both an internal audience here at Packard and  at Stanford Hospital and a National and International Audience to whom I communicate in writing and speaking, the leverage of what we have done has lasting and critical impact beyond the doors of Lucille Packard.

I love the work that we have done. I look forward to continuing my work with Dr Fisher in the future.

Dear Robert,

Perhaps the best testament to the success of the leadership work that you and I have done is that Washington Mutual’s Chief Auditor recommended to his senior management that I fill a newly created role to parachute into a highly complex issue for the bank.  This issue, which is in the public domain, is focused on a Cease and Desist order issued to Washington Mutual by the Federal Regulators to increase the effectiveness of processes that identify and report suspicious activity related to possible criminal activity, money laundering, and terrorist financing across the enterprise.   

When I accepted the assignment, I asked senior management to engage your services. In that role you have helped me to move process, people development, reporting, teaming, hiring, training, peer, direct and upward management with high speed and great efficiency. These outcomes are essential for the bank to meet the requirements of the Federal Regulators.  You have been a critical factor in our progress.    

Your incisive thinking has been exactly what I had hoped for and actually exceeded what I had imagined. You have uncanny intuitive skills that helped me develop and trust my own intuition as a leader.  The outcomes have exceeded my expectations and those of my department. Your expertise in this critical issue for the bank demonstrates your unusual capability to jump in anywhere and create high level success. 

I thank you for your dedication and skill in your work with me and Washington Mutual.

“I wasn’t prepared for the depth of personal caring you demonstrated to all the team members. That is an extraordinary capability and personal trait I’ve never before encountered by anyone in your profession. The energy that you brought to our discussions and the personal commitment to help us with the hard issues has benefited the entire company.”

“Robert has served on the Board of Directors of STC.UNM (the technology transfer organization wholly owned by the University of New Mexico for many years.  His leadership and insight have played a key role in the success of STC.  In particular, his knowledge of organizational dynamics and networking have helped STC further its mission with the expansion of contacts worldwide.”