Laurie McGraw is speaking with Inspiring Woman Tesha Montgomery at the WBL (Women Business Leaders of the U.S. Health Care Industry Foundation) Annual Summit.

As a registered nurse, Tesha spent years delivering patient care.  That experience has served her well.  Today, as a senior executive at a large health system, she sees how easy it is to become disconnected.  Her direct clinical experience has always kept “why we do what we do” front and center.  Her job today requires transforming a large health system to make it easy for the patient.  I think we all know that is easier said than done.  Tesha is excited about her organization’s different approach to innovation – the senior executives responsible are also operators who need to implement the ideas.  This breaks down barriers and increases adoption speed.

As Tesha has moved up in her career, she is quick to share some things she has learned – like running her own race and not having to take on everyone else’s priority as her own.

Tesha has been a WBL member since 2014 and from the beginning she has considered this an investment in herself.  Being a lifelong learner is self-care and for Tesha, WBL is an important part of that.

About WBL

WBL (Women Business Leaders of the U.S. Health Care Industry Foundation) is a nonprofit organization housing the premier network of women executives across the healthcare industry. With 1200+ active members, WBL offers unparalleled opportunities for networking, professional development, and executive education while fostering a welcoming community of peers committed to supporting and advancing one another.

About   Tesha Montgomery

LeTesha Montgomery, RN, MHA, FACHE

Senior Vice President, System Patient Access, Houston Methodist

In her new role as senior vice president of patient access, Tesha is responsible for creating a seamless experience for patients and consumers who need to access care across the 300 different hospital and clinic locations throughout Houston Methodist. Tesha relies on digital technology, innovation and a broad understanding of core operations to drive needed changes and improvements. She also has direct oversight of referral management, access optimization and scheduling teams, and is a member of the Houston Methodist Center for Innovation, an interdisciplinary team leading organizational transformation through technology enablement.

Prior to transitioning into this role, Tesha was the vice president of operations and access for the Houston Methodist Physician Organization, which has more than 1,000 employed physicians and 1.8 million patient visits annually.  In this role, Tesha played a critical part in the organization’s pandemic efforts, leading the system’s roll out of virtual care and its operation of eight system-wide vaccine clinics, making Houston Methodist one of the nation’s top provider of the vaccine.  Her team leveraged technology to auto-schedule boosters, outreach via text, create seamless online scheduling and transformed operations to accommodate patient needs.

Before Houston Methodist, Tesha served four years as the vice president and chief operations officer for the Memorial Hermann Physician Network and Accountable Care Organization, where she was responsible for one of the largest clinically integrated physician associations of 4,000 members. Prior to that, she spent 11 years as an operations leader at Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota.  She is board-certified in healthcare management as an ACHE Fellow and is a licensed Registered Nurse.  In her spare time, Tesha enjoys spending time traveling with her husband, Ted, and their two daughters, Charity and Faith.