Ann Jarris 7:26

And this will change as as other vaccines become available. But the the two initial ones, the Pfizer, and Moderna, these mRNA vaccines are really delicate. If you look at mRNA funny, it falls apart. So the whole ultra comb storage transport was an infrastructure that was built specifically for these vaccines. So when you get them, you have to be very careful about monitoring temperature, making sure that you stay within certain parameters. And we’re only allowed to transport them in our from our, our home office. So you’re really very limited geographically with these vaccines.

Carl J. Cox 8:02

Wow, I did not realize that that it literally only has a one hour transport and then with that, it has to stay in the cold storage, I’m assuming up to Yeah,

Ann Jarris 8:10

correct. Yeah, it has to you have to get approved transport containers with data logging thermometers, and you have to submit the state for approval to move it before you’re allowed to do it. So it’s very, very highly controlled. that’ll change as Johnson & Johnson and other vaccines come out that aren’t so potentially unstable.

Carl J. Cox 8:27

Wow, wow. Yeah, I was actually with the manufacturer. The client I was I was down with and recently in a different state, they were they had the J & J vaccine being delivered to their company. And and so but they you wouldn’t be able to do that often right with with this new vaccine, right, be able to actually get to that type of delivery. Is that correct?

Ann Jarris 8:47

Well, we’ll get we’ll get there. And things are changing rapidly. So really, every week, it’s a different situation. But that’s sort of been the past year has been this constraints, constraints based management has been, you know, supply chains have been severely disrupted. You know, initially, we were having trouble getting PPE and in trouble getting swabs and trouble getting lab reagents. So this is just the next step in the in the scarcity of the past year.

Carl J. Cox 9:13

Well, yeah. So how, if you’re going to be able to give vaccines in Alaska, how do you go about doing that with when you’re based in the Seattle area,

Ann Jarris 9:24

then that’s that was has been tough. So we’re only and we have a one clinic up in, in remote Alaska that we’ve dedicated for the fishing industry specifically. So we did had to go about, you know, getting approval from Alaska to become registered vaccine providers getting onto their, their platforms ordering through them. And that’s again, been an interesting political dance to work with all the various entities. So again, very geographically limited, and a very limited application.

Carl J. Cox 9:51

Wow. Well, one of the for the listeners and is interesting we one of the common connections we had or learned about is You’ve been serving Foss Maritime who’s one of the large, you know, maritime and tugboat. My mom actually worked in the tugboat industry. For Foss, he’s got an interesting to see that connection. So what about that part? Right? You have people, some of the biggest challenges has been shipping, right, and somebody gets COVID, or gets sick in the middle of the ocean. So first of all, you are already helping and doing telemedicine right for for the maritime industry. What has happened when there is this, you know, people have been stuck in a boat, because then people will let them into port, it’s not as much that happening right now. But that was happening right for a period of time. Give me some insight that that just real challenges of how do you deal with these really unique circumstances of 20 to 100 people or perhaps 1000s of people on a boat, and they’re stuck?

Ann Jarris 10:49

Erin, do you want to kind of talk about how we first found out about COVID? Yeah, that’s

Erin Cavin 10:54

probably so we’ve been involved in COVID, since way before it hit the United States, because one of our clients runs oil tankers to China. And they gave us a call in January of 2020, asking for support protocols that naturally lead out into supporting the Seattle based Alaska fishing industry, with helping them set up protocols helping them prepare to respond to the march 24 directive from the governor of alaska that said, you had to submit a plan to the state of Alaska, if you’re going to continue, if you’re going to bring into up there on a fishing vessel. And that plan then led to our testing. And as Ann was already talking about with constraints based, we started testing the fishing industry at the end of April. It wasn’t until the night before that we knew we were going to actually have supplies available to do the testing that we were promising. And of all the companies that followed the protocol that Ann worked with the industry to create, there was really only one company that didn’t follow it. And they were really the only company that had mass outbreaks. So at least in the first phase of it, we weren’t dealing much with it. On board vessels. Now later, we started to get some and part of the protocols were how to isolate people how to get them off the vessel, once they came into a harbor and get them to some place where they could be treated, that I missed anything Ann?

Ann Jarris 12:33

from an international standpoint, it’s been very challenging, not because not with COVID outbreaks on board, but with inability to get people off for medical care at ports, because every port just shut down. And so you’d be normal, you’d want to get somebody off to go see a doctor. And that just wasn’t allowed. So we really did have to change how we tried to deliver healthcare at sea.

Erin Cavin 12:53

But this is what we do. We are a company that’s built for risk management and emergency response. So unlike almost any other company out there, we were uniquely suited to be able to do what we did. And then it became also sort of a moral imperative and a social justice issue for us that we had to do this.

Carl J. Cox 13:18

I think that one of the things you said I want to make sure the listeners picked up I thought was really fast. And you said that everyone didn’t have a problem, except for the one that didn’t follow the protocols. Is that what I heard correctly?

Erin Cavin 13:31

That is what you heard.

Carl J. Cox 13:34

So I’m a big believer in cause and effect. And I think that’s really fascinating of when when people did the right things, they had less reward basically had effectively no too little risk. And then that that didn’t follow it at all had significant will had a real problems. And so that’s that’s really interesting. When did it makes sense, right? It’s completely logical. But it’s fascinating how it actually played out.

Ann Jarris 13:56

That was an interesting time because no one knew. I mean, we were literally making this up based on what we thought was going to happen. We didn’t have any guidance, the CDC hadn’t come out with guidance, the national organizations hadn’t come out with guidance, we literally were the tip of the spear here. And, you know, we’re saying this is what we believe is right, but I couldn’t prove it. So it’s been

Erin Cavin 14:16

a while and it was fun to win, especially that very first round of testing. We’ve determined that certainly in the United States, possibly in the world, we’re one of the first companies to do systematic testing of asymptomatic people. And that provided University of Washington with data in order to track the how the disease progresses and how well their tests were working. That was fascinating.

Ann Jarris 14:44

We were able to document asymptomatic transmission in late April and no one was talking about that.

Carl J. Cox 14:50

I remember that and being a grad from the University of Washington. I was following actually information really closely. It was at the Princess was that the ship that was in.

Ann Jarris 15:00

Yeah. Right. Yeah.

Carl J. Cox 15:02

Yes. And it was so interesting, because I felt that and I recall, there was also a ship, a navy ship that was I think, out of Guam or something that that was, that was like the perfect test analysis, right, and validation of what happens when you’re stuck on a boat. And there’s a COVID outbreak, you know, and is that practically what theoretically could happen if people are under the same constraints here, but you were actually dealing with it directly, you know, with with ships and, and things of that nature. I I also had met my father was in the Merchant Marines. And I he’s been long since retired. But I can’t imagine once again, being stuck on these ships that don’t have a whole lot, right and being not allowed into port because people are afraid of you bringing COVID right to their lands. What a terrible challenge. So let’s talk about two elements because you have your core business. And then you had this current covid 19. business. So for COVID-19. How are you measuring success today? What what what is something that’s, that is going to be what you consider successful.

Ann Jarris 16:04

That’s a great topic, and I’ll kind of give my worldview and then Erin can give her worldview, this is obviously something that we’re struggling with is a very rapidly growing company. I mean, we went from eight w two employees a year ago to over 50. Now, so it’s just, it’s just been, you know, grabbing a rocket ship and hanging on. And thank you a big shout out to Terry, we got involved with him in April of 2020. And I remember, sort of, you know, railing against that saying, We’re not big enough for this. We don’t need this. But you know, thank god Erin forced us to do that and get our get our infrastructure in place for the rapid growth that came. But that’s the question we do, what we’re dealing with right now is how do you measure success? You know, again, we went to business school, for reasons that we have a strategy map, we have a balanced scorecard. We have our metrics. But that’s what we’re trying to figure out now is what can we realistically measure? What do we have the infrastructure to measure? What would require us to hire a team of people in order to be able to measure and how relevant are those metrics? So there’s very hard metrics that we are, we’re deciding what the right ones are to follow. And then there’s the soft metrics. I mean, you know, I’m sure we’ll talk about it. But what is it? Why Why did he Why do you do this? You know, what is it that that motivates you to put this amount of work in? And I think both Erin and I agree that what we’ve enjoyed the most over the past year is watching people grow, is bringing people in, in this sort of entry level opportunity and seeing, you know, what, what sparks their interest, and how can we grow them through the organization. One of our big challenges a year ago was it was we’re pretty lean. And you know, we just didn’t have the resources to hire a lot. But this year has, has really brought us a huge talent pool. So once we get out of COVID, and go forward, are we have a wonderful team in place, and I’m very excited to get them dealing with more long term strategy issues.

Erin Cavin 17:51

an unstoppable team really,

Ann Jarris 17:55

you know, what do you what are your measures? What do you think about this? Well,

Erin Cavin 17:59

I Well, I’m surprised you didn’t talk about our experiences. One of the fellows at Seattle University’s Executive MBA program is Alan Mulally, the former CEO of Ford, and head of commercial airplanes at Boeing. And he developed the engineer that he is he developed a very engineering type system to measure to measure how well people are working together and how you’re all aiming at one single goal in the end. And we’ve been working very hard to translate our strategy map and translate all of the, the both the concrete and the squishier things, you know, employee, employee retention is concrete, but it’s also kind of squishy, you know, you want to know what’s going on whether when they’re here, whether they’re happy, are they being developed? Are we putting the training in the right place? So we’re kind of trying to build out those metrics right now? It’s working.

Ann Jarris 19:00

I think it doesn’t, it’s not like you do it. And you’re done. I mean, again, yeah. Here’s what you can measure what you should measure and what’s a meaningful measure, and that that changes all the time. But yes, having having a structured disciplined approach to it is really the key. I remember I remember Alan saying that he’s, you know, that people are accessible because they measure everything,

Carl J. Cox 19:21

though. Yep. I yeah, yeah. There’s the book, you Measure What Matters I have right behind me of John Doerr. Right. I think one of the things that you said that’s so huge is understanding that you have to consistently look at the metrics to see what’s changing and what’s not changing. And and, you know, Erin, you brought up one of our favorite books, The Goal, right, from from Goldratt, and the Theory of Constraints and understanding that, you know, some measurements aren’t even relevant sometimes, but when it becomes the bottleneck, it’s the most important factor, right? You know, understanding what that is and the challenge behind it, and I love it. How you are looking Add these different metrics. Do you talk about leading versus lagging indicators? Is that something that you do consider we do. That is the what I mentioned, the the the Ah, sorry, the Harvard Business Review studies, that’s the key element behind it is, most organizations, about 80 to 90% of their metrics are all lagging. And their organizations that really figured out they turn into 80 90% of their metrics are leading. And and it’s because they’re controllable, right, these are the things that we can control day to day to actually have an impact on the outcome. And that’s, that’s the secret sauce, of course, figure out what the right ones are as a challenge, right? And modifies and changes especially you have something depth, so dynamic, that the excellent answers, and I love it that you mentioned Alan Mulally and his impact and how it had an impact on you all, to help drive and do the right things. So man, Ma’am, I wish so let’s talk about briefly that why, and then we’re gonna go into the personal side. But let’s talk about the why part. That’s such an important element, right? We want why to kind of we, the organization existing? What is that big? Why that you found out that vision and value that’s driving you to put all of our, our, you know, long hours to get things done?

Ann Jarris 21:18

Oh, that’s a big question. Um, you know, it’s we talk about strategy maps. And I remember in business school just kind of being annoyed that the the top metric was always a financial metric. And I’m like, does it really have to be people like, yes, and you go to business school, you need a successful business. So for a while I fought against that, in our top metric was our vessel medical officer satisfaction, because we believed in our vessel medical officers were happy, then that meant that the crew member was happy, the company was happy, and our physicians and we were happy. But again, it’s a squishy metric to measure. And that was fine when we were small. And this was, you know, we were learning. But now that we’ve grown into a real company, I understand why the why the top metric has to be financial, I mean, when you know, you’re supporting a very enormous payroll, you really want to make sure that that your cash flow is there. So the why switches a lot. I mean, our core values are solid, we spend a lot of time especially when we knew that Ray was sick, we spent a lot of time really understanding his his view of the world, and how, how those values mesh with our view of the world and what we wanted to accomplish. So having a very clear core mission, vision and values has been really helpful, especially as we grow fast and bringing on new people we can fairly rapidly indoctrinate them into into our corporate culture. So for me, that’s the why I mean, this is I talking to Erin sometime in COVID. I was like, This is what we were put on earth to do. I mean, it all kind of came together the fact that Seattle was the epicenter of COVID, the fact that we had this great use case of the maritime industry, the fact that, you know, all of our relationships had just come together, we were in the right place at the right time. And I’m like, there’s no question in my mind. This is this is our mission, this is what we’re here to do. So the why has never really been much of a question. Going forward. It’s I’m honored and privileged to be in this position where we can actually make a difference in the world and I don’t really know what more in life you need more than that. Erin?

Erin Cavin 23:16

saving the fishing industry. I mean, like without the work that way, without the work that we that we did that Discovery Health without the vision that Ann put in place with Ray. And without that. No kidding. I do not believe that there would have been a salmon fishing industry. Salmon and salmon season last year.

Carl J. Cox 23:37

Wow. Wow, that’s a that’s a huge that’s huge. That is absolutely huge. For so many different reasons. I love it. I love how you’ve talked about this. We were we I wish we could have worked out to dive in more but we don’t just due to the context. So we’re gonna hit real quick and the points the personal side. Man, you guys are working like crazy right now. How are you getting? How are you measuring success? How well let me clarify what type of activities you’re doing to help make sure you’re keeping your energy going on a day to day basis so you don’t burn out or you don’t you know, you make sure you’re focused on the right things from a personal perspective.

Ann Jarris 24:18

You know, I think one of the the legs up we had is that we were a virtual company to start with so when COVID hit and everybody went to telecommuting, it didn’t change our business at all. So we’ve had very good communication modalities in place and art we talk a lot. So that’s for me has really been my mental health is that being able to talk to my team, being able to kind of get feedback, whatever I’m thinking of just having that that that dialogue and for what you know Erin and I are total opposites. It’s wonderful can total opposite communication styles, personality, everything. And it just turned out when I was down, she was up when she was down. I was up. It it just worked out great in that response. He Ain’t no need to have this dialogue,

Erin Cavin 25:02

I’m going to reiterate that during graduate school, we had to take every frickin personality test that was out there. And we are literally polar opposites in every single one of them. Um, you know, if she’s on the upper right hand corner, I’m on the lower left hand corner all the time. And it It’s fantastic. I mean, having a really strong working relationship I didn’t, this is kind of off topic a little bit. But I didn’t realize, you know, when you talk to these people, the C suite individuals, I never really realized how special the relationship is between the CEO and her. And her closest confidant. It is a very particular relationship. And I think that, Ann is right, a lot of our success is very dependent on our communication with each other. And then with our larger leadership team as well.

Ann Jarris 25:57

I mean, it’s gonna be a mess, you know, you’re gonna, you’re gonna fight, you’re going to argue that you disagree, this is stressful, stressful things, you’re dealing with people’s lives and money, and, you know, just insanity. So the fact that we can disagree in a respectful and productive manner, has been has been wonderful. You know, as our executive team grew, it’s funny, we brought on two more people. And they’re they, they’re sort of an Erin type personality and an Ann type personality and watching them that sort of fight and argue is, it’s been fun.

Carl J. Cox 26:33

Well, Ann

Ann Jarris 26:34

And we don’t really care.

Carl J. Cox 26:36

That’s awesome. And I think I give you a lot of credit to bring you on. And obviously, you had that relationship back at Seattle University, but that you took on something that was so different, because that’s such an important part of leadership of trusting somebody who thinks completely different, but understanding they’re helping your own blind spots, right? In the areas where you’re not your strengths, and you’re in, you’re heading in the right direction to that. And also, you know, this is that all is CEO is out there being the CEO is the loneliest position in a company, and and to have somebody you could trust like Erin, to have be a confidant and to help know that go the right direction. You’re fortunate because not all CEOs have that. And so that you mentioned that I think that’s a awesome insight, you know, behind going through there. So we’ll get to my last question. I’ve loved this conversation that we’ve had, I like to ask about books and and you’re honest, like, I don’t have time to read books. Right. Exactly. But But, but you’ve read a lot. And there have been some significant ones in the past. share with our audience, a few books that you’re just like, these are just books you have to read if you’re being an entrepreneur, and and you’re running a growing business. Yeah, you

Ann Jarris 27:50

know, I want to come out with some great esoteric recommendation that makes me sound very intelligent, a lot. But for me Erin’s job, she’s the philosophy major. For me, it was really the core business school books. And they made sense, you know, Switch and Getting to Yes, and Fierce Conversations and Fierce Leadership. I mean, they’re American Icon. By Mulally. It’s like they’re trying to tell you something, you know, the core tenants of how you run a business are fairly straightforward and immutable. And how you manage people and manage change. There are techniques for that. So for me, it was those real core business school books that that got my thinking along. These are, this is a solid backbone to run a business on. I didn’t need anything new or special or fancy. I needed to learn the fundamentals of running a business.

Carl J. Cox 28:37

Yeah, it’s awesome. Yeah, absolutely.

Erin Cavin 28:40

Oh, well, I obviously Goldratt. I’m a huge Critical Chain. And The Goal, a huge fan of those. It was brain bending for me to understand that you could do constraints based management and non manufacturing setting. Was was light went off that day. And then we were just talking earlier I and already mentioned the Fierce Leadership and Fierce Conversations. But in addition to that, there’s Leadership and Self-Deception that we both liked, and Leadership on the Line. Heifetz.

Carl J. Cox 29:15

great suggestions, I love it. So with that, what’s the best way that people can learn more about your organization and what you’re doing? Well, certainly

Ann Jarris 29:27

our website so we that’s actually probably one of the big strategy questions is what you know, your website reflects who you are, you know, Mulally always said if you want to know what your priorities are, look at your calendar. If you want to know what our priorities are, look at our website, and I was actually a little disappointed I went on it and it was all about travel testing for COVID. And I couldn’t even find our commercial maritime section. So please go to our website. It is deep and complex. But it’s funny how it changes how our according to our priorities changed. So if you’re interested in COVID vaccination or testing. Our website has a lot of information. If you’re interested in our personal maritime and Occupational Health Solutions, you got to dig a little bit further, but it is there.

Carl J. Cox 30:09

And what’s the specific URL for that? 

Ann Jarris 30:12

discoveryhealthmd.com

Carl J. Cox 30:15

Thank you. Perfect. Well, Ann and Erin this has been a true pleasure. I know you’re wildly busy and to take a moment to share with our audience and to be on the Measure Success Podcast has been absolutely brilliant. So thank you so much for all your insights and what you’re doing to make a difference in the world. You’re right when you find yourself in your sweet spot of getting there. It’s amazing. And so I congratulate you for getting to that point. And and thank you so much for listening to Measure Success Podcast and we’re wishing you the audience the very best at measuring your success. Thank you.

Outro 30:55

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