The Blessing/Curse of Scripps College

Towards the end of the day yesterday, I found myself in a very interesting conversation with two directors in my division. Our conversation ended up on the topic of whether the work we do here at Hopkins is on the philanthropic side of the spectrum, helping consumers be more aware of how and where they can get quality health care or if it's all about profit for the Institution.

My boss (Director 1) used to work at Big Bad Insurance Company and is on my side, the side that says "At the end of the day, we do good work here." Yes, we get paid to promote the services that make money, but it's not all about profit margin. (Director 1's boss at Big Bad Insurance Company used to say "If there's no margin, there's no mission").

Director 2 has worked at Hopkins for a really long time and is more on the business side of things. Not a bad thing, for sure. She does her job very well and promotes the clinical departments on a fee-for-service basis, so the margin has a huge impact on the work she does and vice versa.

My point here is that I'm glad that, when our division split, I ended up on the side with Director 1, promoting the institution as a whole and our affiliate businesses. I go home at night feeling good about what I do during the day. I prefer to think that promoting our service centers throughout the Baltimore area helps people who live toward suburbia and are scared of ghetto downtown Baltimore be more aware that they can get the same, Hopkins quality care closer to their homes. They don't have to choose sub-standard care so they can stay in their comfort zone. I prefer to think of it this way, rather than the ugly truth that we make more money when people go to one of these clinics than at the main hospital downtown.