Tages-Anzeiger, Crisis at Zurich Children's Hospital:
Tagesanzeiger, Maren Meyer in an interview with Erik Wirz
These three construction sites await the new Kispi management
In brief:
- Zurich Children's Hospital is urgently looking for a successor to the outgoing CEO.
- Georg Schäppi leaves the hospital in a financially strained situation.
- The search is proving difficult, as several hospitals are looking for new managers.
- The new management is under pressure to successfully implement the business plan.
The Zurich Children's Hospital (Kispi) cannot rest. After hospital director Georg Schäppi unexpectedly announced his resignation on Tuesday after just five years in office, the search for a successor is in full swing. Schäppi will be leaving the hospital at the end of June1 for the Davos medical campus. This means that Kispi only has a few months to find a new head.
The CEO position will now be advertised publicly and a search committee will be set up, explains Martin Vollenwyder, President of the Eleonorenstiftung, the hospital's sponsor. In addition, the search for a successor will also begin with the support of an external company.
The search for a successor is likely to be difficult.
It is generally not easy to find suitable managers in the hospital sector, says Erik Wirz, Managing Partner at Wirz & Partners.
The headhunting company specialises in personnel recruitment in the hospital and healthcare sector. To make matters worse, several hospitals in Switzerland are currently looking for new managers.
Schäppi's legacy also weighs heavily. These are the most important issues awaiting a new head at Kispi:
1 An expensive new build
The new Kispi buildings by star architects Herzog & de Meuron2 will be occupied in autumn 2024. This is good news so far. However, the construction left a considerable financial hole. Instead of the calculated CHF 625 million, the costs rose to CHF 735 million. Last April, the Kispi therefore had to be rescued from insolvency by the canton.
The canton granted loans totalling CHF 250 million. The Kispi must repay these loans over a period of 25 years with interest. In addition, a bond for CHF 200 million must be refinanced in 2028. Responsibility for this would lie with the new hospital management.
2 Pressure from all sides
The Kispi Eleonorenstiftung is reporting a loss of CHF 10.1 million for 2023. In addition, the inadequate tariffs in paediatrics and the increased costs of the new building project in hospital operations led to an operating loss of 29.4 million francs. A business plan should bring the hospital back into the black by 2026. Schäppi's successor will have to implement this business plan.
Dass die finanzielle Schieflage die Nachfolgesuche weiter erschwert, glaubt Erik Wirz jedoch nicht:
«It will be just as difficult to find a successor as for any other hospital, because a professional is not deterred by this starting position.» The profile of the successor search is a major challenge:
Hospital management must be able to balance the tension between patient welfare, regulatory requirements and the economic success of the hospital.
«The greater the financial pressure, the higher the staff turnover,», says Wirz. It is up to the new management to prevent the financial problems from spilling over into the medical sector - so that one construction site does not turn into several.
3 A canton that will have a say in the future
The loans from the canton are subject to conditions: In future, the canton will once again appoint two representatives to the Board of Trustees of the Eleonorenstiftung. They will ensure that the hospital adheres to its business plan. The new management of the Kispi will therefore be monitored more closely by the canton in its work, which could increase the pressure even further.
This environment makes it difficult to find the right manager, says Wirz. ‘They have to fit in with the culture of the hospital, otherwise problems are not solved but new ones are created,’ he says.
The time to find a suitable successor is short: a search at this management level normally takes three to four months. The person's notice period must also be taken into account. This is usually between three and six months. So it will be tight until July.
Correction: An earlier version stated that the loans totalling CHF 250 million would have to be repaid by 2028. This is incorrect; the Kispi has 25 years to do so.
1. https://www.tagesanzeiger.ch/ceo-verlaesst-kinderspital-zuerich-das-sagt-der-stiftungspraesident-528472450063
2. https://www.tagesanzeiger.ch/kinderspital-das-neue-zuercher-kispi-ist-in-betrieb-519018922312
