Editorial, St. Louis American, April 4, 2007

Anyone in a leadership position in the St. Louis metropolitan area should consider the impact that Andrew Ziskind, M.D., has had on Barnes-Jewish Hospital since he came to St. Louis in May 2005 to serve as its president. Ziskind has told the American that the segregation and racial disparities he found in St. Louis shocked him, compared to his previous working and community relationships at the University of Washington in Seattle and the University of Maryland in College Park.

Ziskind''s response was not to pack his bags and leave our region for a city that had solved more of the daunting issues that still confront us. Nor did he adapt himself to an unjust social context and continue to give the hospital and the region the sort of mediocre leadership to which we have become accustomed. With a determined sense of urgency and the will to confront the entrenched status quo, Ziskind did just the opposite - he set about to work to change the corporate culture at Barnes-Jewish Hospital in the direction of diversity, not hesitating to speak candidly to the media (including the black press) about past racism at his institution.

With Ziskind, talk has not been cheap nor idle. He took his message directly to the board of the powerfully endowed Barnes-Jewish Hospital Foundation, which typically supports advanced research and other professional endeavors that add glory to the medical center in the eyes of its international peers and benefactors. Make no mistake: Every dime Ziskind gets from the foundation to fund diversity initiatives - and he has leveraged over a million dollars in a very short time - is money he will not be able to direct to other efforts that might, in fact, add more sparkle to Barnes-Jewish Hospital and his tenure there.

This is the chief executive of one of St. Louis'' largest employers talking about making expensive corporate commitments to further social justice. And he talks this talk to other regional executives who serve on the boards of the hospital and its foundation. If the recent gains of Barnes-Jewish Hospital and the Washington University School of Medicine in retention of minority physicians (reported on 1A this week) are unprecedented, equally unprecedented is the example of Andy Ziskind as a chief executive in the St. Louis metropolitan area.

The intention here is not to insult our homegrown leaders in order to praise the shining example of a determined and progressive outsider. It is, rather, to encourage them to see St. Louis through Ziskind''s eyes - to be jolted now, if they have not been jolted before, with how bitterly divided and segregated our area is along racial lines, and with how much more opportunity for a better, more productive life (for health care, educational opportunity, meaningful employment) is to be found in white St. Louis than in black St. Louis. The benefits of better health go beyond the moral and measurable economic benefits and include greater productivity with improved health care for workers as well as reduced costs.

More importantly, after receiving this painful jolt, our leaders must not flee from the challenge, physically or figuratively, nor bury it in the mass of priorities that confront any executive or elected official. The challenge is to take the biggest, messiest, most frustrating problems - a systemic problem whose benefit to the bottom-line is long-term and difficult for many to appreciate - and put it at the top of the list.

"Diversity first" has become a core principle at Barnes-Jewish Hospital in the astonishingly brief period of time that Ziskind has been at the helm. We encourage every other corporate and political leader in this region to summon the will to follow this example and challenge their organizations to respect and advance diversity from within. Then, watch how much faster all of St. Louis will develop, once we tackle, rather than bury, one of our biggest problems of all.