Meet Tom
A passionate, ethical leader, Thomas Wisnieski has four decades of experience delivering quality care to Veterans receiving services in the Veterans Health Administration (VHA).
For the past nine years, Tom achieved improved metrics in quality, safety, and value categories while leading the most complex VA Healthcare system in the nation—a healthcare system with approximately 6,000 employees and a $1.4 billion budget, serving an area as large as the State of South Carolina.
Throughout his career, Tom demonstrated leadership first and foremost by being in touch with employees and patients—from the small things like walking around and engaging, to outlining goals and expectations, investing in people and opportunities for improvement, recognizing and rewarding accomplishments, and encouraging fun while working.
“I have spent most of my working life in the service of Veterans, their families, and the Veterans Health Administration. I continue performing that function to this day ably assisting Veterans and their family members with issues revolving around healthcare and Veterans benefits. I find great value in this work.”
A collaborative, servant leader.
COVID brought about challenges to all of society. As Director of the North Florida/South Georgia Veterans Healthcare system (NF/SGHCS), Tom championed research participation with Janssen COVID vaccine trials, convalescent plasma, and monoclonal antibodies therapies to speed up treatment for patients.
Within this healthcare system, Tom rapidly initiated the expansion of Veterans Video Connect (VVC) programs to connect Veterans with health care providers via telemedicine. VVC encounters increased from less than 1,000 per month to greater than 29,000 per month.
Tom’s system further increased the percentage of Veterans who received at least one telehealth visit and implemented a bed surge plan to increase our patient capacity. Negative pressure rooms were increased to meet COVID inpatient demand and clinical staff were deployed on mission assignments to support community nursing homes with infection control issues across the State of Florida.
“My senior executive level experience has provided opportunities to develop and execute solutions to address problems across the Veterans Health Administration. Through passionate, dedicated leadership, I was able to help spur significant improvements in healthcare quality and metrics along with patient access. Through engagement and employee collaboration, we were able to address complex problems, develop solutions, and execute them to meet the mission requirements.”
While at NF/SGHCS, Tom oversaw increased Graduate Medical Enhancement in specialties such as Internal Medicine, Pulmonary, Psychiatry, Surgery and Critical Care, which provided education and improved care for Veterans. Approximately 2,000 students participated in various medical and administrative studies across the enterprise each year.
Tom was awarded a Continuous Quality Improvement/Facilitator Certifications from the Rochester Institute of Technology and utilizes these skills in formal and informal work situations.
While serving at NF/SGHCS, Tom instituted actions for the system to become a recognized Center of Innovation, which included hiring an Innovation Coordinator who became the VHA’s Innovation Champion in 2020. His healthcare system completed over 80 green/black belt projects between FY2017 and FY 2020, and he implemented Shark Tank scenarios for employees to pitch their innovation ideas, clinical and administrative, to Senior Management, seeking approval and seed funding.
These evidence-based practices were so successful that, with sustainment, they spread to a variety of other VA healthcare systems and Veterans Integrated Service Networks (VISNs).
Tom also led NF/SGHCS’s Diversity and Inclusion initiatives with a team that consisted of multiethnic employees, with varying job assignments, supervisory and rank-and-file employees across the system, addressing and developing processes to build a supportive and inclusive workplace culture.
He further led the transition to a decentralized resource management system for all individual services.
“We used a commercial software system to manage staff, budget and workload for resources and operations. The initial year of implementation saw the system’s $50M budget gap reduced to 0. Each subsequent fiscal year began and ended with a balanced budget. Services were more satisfied with having the financial responsibility to run their own programs.”
During his VA career, Tom has also had multiple Emergency Management experiences in preplanning for, dealing with and recovery actions. From numerous hurricanes, COVID, snowstorms and an active shooter, he is a seasoned senior executive who has successfully dealt with those critical situations which require immediate leadership and actions.
As Chief Executive Officer at the Gulf Coast VA Healthcare system, Tom led the reconstruction of the Gulfport facility on the Biloxi campus following its destruction by Hurricane Katrina. At NF/SGHCS, he led the construction of replacement clinics and the design, approval and construction start of additional new clinics to meet the service demands brought on by additional Veterans entering the system. Tom established a Joint Incentive Fund (J.I.F.) program with Jacksonville Naval Hospital to supply VA staff who provided inpatient services to Veterans in the Jacksonville market.
Through experience, Tom has recognized the key to success isn’t just building great teams, but engaging the community in various endeavors, such as Vietnam Veterans Tributes and building a Gold Star family memorial garden on the grounds of the medical center. Because of this, he was recognized and awarded by community leaders for his engagement on behalf of Veterans.
Since entering the private sector, Tom has consulted with clients including Barbaricum, Booz Allen Hamilton, Inc., Document Storage Systems (DSS Inc.), and O.R. Trax.
With varied and successful experiences in many elements of healthcare management across a productive 39-year career, Tom Wisnieski has the expertise to help you gain clarity and effectively navigate the Veterans Health Administration or Department of Defense contracting process. And he has the proven leadership to assist with your Organizational Development and Management Consulting needs.