Search firm to help find new UPHS head

The University has hired the executive search firm Spencer Stuart to assist in finding a new Health System Chief Executive Officer and dean of the Medical School. Last month, a 16-member search committee was formed to find the replacement for former Health System CEO and interim dean Peter Traber, who resigned in July after just a few months at UPHS' helm for a job in the private sector. After receiving eight proposals and interviewing three of its top candidates, University President Judith Rodin and committee chair Dwight Evans picked Spencer Stuart as their first choice to help Penn. "We found them to have the greatest breadth and the greatest degree of experience," Rodin said. "They have done searches in academic medical centers exactly like ours," she added. Rodin and Evans, the Psychiatry department chairman, discussed their selection with the entire search committee at its first meeting on October 13, which gave its approval for the selection. The committee includes several members of the medical school faculty, as well as high-ranking University administrators. Rodin formally announced the decision last week. Spencer Stuart worked with the University during a 14-month search for the internally appointed Wharton School Dean Patrick Harker, who received the job last February. The firm also helped bring Rodin to Penn in 1995. Rodin said officials were impressed with Spencer Stuart's ties to qualified candidates in the private sector. "They now say that there's some good cohort of scientists who have run businesses who might be ready to come back [to academia]," Rodin explained. "We thought that was a very interesting spector that we might not have thought of or had access to," she said. She added that Spencer Stuart has done numerous medical school dean searches and searches for major hospital chains. Penn administrators have repeatedly said that they are looking for a single person to hold both the CEO and the dean position. According to Rodin, the committee has not started examining potential candidates, but will instead focus on doing an assessment of the Health System and Medical School and preparing materials about the job for potential candidates, with the help of Spencer Stuart. "They'll prepare a position paper and a report for the search committee," Rodin explained. Though these searches typically take around three to six months, a timeline has not been set for this particular search. Many recent academic searches at Penn have dragged on for about a year -- all resulting in the appointment of an internal candidate. Traber was appointed to the top of the beleaguered health system after Rodin ousted longtime CEO and dean William Kelley last February. Traber was named permanent CEO just weeks later, but was serving as interim dean at the time of his departure because University regulations require a consultative search process for academic appointments. Many had expected that he would eventually be appointed Medical School dean permanently. Rodin said an outside search firm is useful because it isn't tied to the institution -- something candidates sometimes find more trustworthy. "The candidates often have questions they would rather talk to a non-institutional person about," Rodin noted.

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