Early in my career, I would have been described by my mentors as motivated to the extent of sometimes being impatient - very much results-oriented and constantly seeking new challenges and learnings. The characteristics that contribute to both my strengths and weaknesses have not really changed over time but have only coloured with age and maturity. Like many others, my career path leveraged these characteristics.

When I graduated with my Masters Degree in Business over 20 years ago, I did not know what I wanted to do. Therefore, to ensure the most exposure to different roles, businesses and problems, I went into management consulting - specifically healthcare. The consulting environment suited my interests so well that, over my career, I went in and out of management consulting three times, with three different firms, for a total of 50% of my 24 years in healthcare. The best part was that consulting was not one job but many. This was a great learning ground. Over the consulting term, I was promoted to Partner/Vice-President and worked with hospitals, large healthcare systems, healthcare insurance companies, large physician group practices and, in the dot-com period, non-healthcare companies wanting to capitalize on the healthcare industry. My experiences spanned operations, finance and strategic planning.

Consulting, even though challenging and full of learning opportunities, was project-oriented, and rarely did I have the opportunity to see through to full implementation the fruits of my labour. I felt that to be a better consultant, I also had to be a client. With that goal in mind, and family on the way, I spent the remaining 50% of my career in the healthcare industry doing a variety of different things: as an administrator for several large physician group practices, as financial officer of a hospital and now as CIO with Capital Health in Edmonton.

In reviewing my career path, I wouldn't change anything, because, other than changing industries, I was fortunate to have sampled a little of everything along the way. This has by no means made me an expert in everything, but the value it has brought to my career is perspective on how others view their roles and needs. This perspective has assisted me in doing a better job of translating information technology into business value for Capital Health. A recent and exciting example of this was the development of netCARE, the electronic health record, at Capital Health. Our success in this initiative has not been related to the build of technology but is directly related to the clinicians' acceptance and adoption of it as part of their practice and the contribution it is making to improving patient care.

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