A Legacy of Innovation in Healthcare (ft. Tom Curtin)

- Welcome to Digital Voices.

“We're healthcare and life science leaders”

explore the real work behind transformation. This podcast is about people, leadership, and the conversations that move healthcare forward. Now you're host, Ed Marks. - Ed here and welcome to another edition of Digital Voices.

Thank you for listening. We know you have so many different choices. Great podcast out there. We've chosen to spend time with Tom and I. We're really thankful.

Now we're gonna make this worth your while. So I am excited to have Tom Curtin. He's the CEO of Amtelco with us on Digital Voices. Tom, welcome. - Thank you very much, Ed, for having me.

Appreciate it. - I'm really excited about this 'cause it's a very American story. And I won't say more than that. I'll just let you tell us a little bit about Amtelco.

As a time comes, the first time we met in person was actually at the Amtelco annual, I don't think you call it a conference, but you call it a seminar. - Yeah, some more.

- Yep. - It was amazing.

First, the people in Amtelco are amazing people.

You've done, thank you. - You and your team are done a great job of creating this culture and finding just the right talent. And then secondly, the customers I met were amazing. And they were doing amazing things.

And I just thought, we need to get out, we need to talk. We need to have you on Ed talks. And then maybe the kicker was, we actually did like a run.

Early the morning of a seminar. Who shows up to that? A lot of people showed up, at least for the photograph. - So, that was one, very fun. - It was really cool.

So I'm so happy you're with us.

“But Tom, the most important question I have during our time”

is what songs are in your playlist? Like what kind of music do you like to listen to? - Well, that's a really great question.

Let's see your goals from Elton John

to, let's say, Pink Floyd, to even way back when. And well, she's still around, share. - Yeah. - And I did see Frank Sinatra way back when in concert. So I still love listening to Frank.

- Man. - So it goes all over the map. You know, I love music. I do love music. - I would love, I would have given anything

to see Frank Sinatra back in the day. That was pretty awesome. - Yeah, and share was still kicking it at the Grammys in 2020. - They know.

- Man, you know you're on something special. If you withstand the test of time. So tell us your story, like who are you? Where did you grow up? Just what was your life like?

- Okay, yeah, great question. Madison was constant for all my life.

“Mom and Dad had seven kids, four daughters, three sons.”

We lived a pretty darn good life in a nice house at my dad built with a couple of his buddies across from a big park and it was a great neighborhood. Lots of kids in it. So in the summer, all the kids in the neighborhood

were kicked out of their houses and sent to the park to play all day long and don't come home until dinner. - Yeah. - I went to the winter.

That park turned you into an ice skating rink. And we go over there after school, play hockey, and play keep away. And that's sort of how we got into speed skating. One of the kids who was a speed skater

told his dad about me how good I was at being the last one on the ice to get caught. So I got into speed skating in a short track and long track speed skating for five years. And that was a lot of fun.

It was very competitive, a lot of fun. Then in high school, I did football and quickly damaged the knee so I couldn't do football any longer so I settled into track. And not like you had, I did very short distances.

I just did the sprints and relays, but had a lot of fun doing it. Then a college, I fell back on a hockey and just did intermereal sports and was a gold tender for a hockey team.

And we won the championship a couple years. So it was great, yeah, and loud fun. - Well, it sounds like, really, the idea list is to, you know, growing up. As you were sharing all that, I could picture that,

including you going around on a short track speed skating. That sounds like so cool. Well, what a great way to grow up. It was fun.

- Tom, was there a moment later on or maybe during your childhood? I like a pivotal moment that fundamentally changed your direction? - Well, I asked my wife about this question

and she said, you're looking at her. (laughs) I said, well, I was gonna say that on you, of course. And yes, she did change, you know, she was pivotal. My wife Mary was pivotal in my life.

We have three great kids at four grand sons and getting married also helps you focus

- Yeah.

- So I was married young in my career

“and it helped me really to get a laser focus”

when I'm doing it. So I think it helped a lot. - Yeah. - How long have you been married? 42 years.

- Wow, congratulations. - That's awesome. - Real lucky. - And blood. - So you chose history

and then Italian as college undergrad. How does that, I get the history part and tell us about the Italian? - Well, I enjoy history and I was lucky enough to have, you know, a kids are pretty influenced

by their teachers. And I was lucky enough to have a professor who just was so emotionally engaged in the history and expressed it so well. So he got me really, really, you know, peaked

as far as my interest in history. Then Italian, I took Spanish in high school and, you know, everybody had to take Spanish in high school and I was like, I don't want to take Spanish again in college.

- Yeah. - And Italian, to me, when I listened to Italian, it sounded so much like a romantic language that I was like, let me in there. (laughs)

- Well, I had fun with that. - That's great.

Tell us about your first job ever

and then your first job after college. - Well, my first job ever was in the summer

“and I think my mom or dad signed me up for it”

and I don't know what I did wrong but it was, it was to go out in the farm fields and detachable corn. So it was very high, sticky, rainy, muddy but I learned to appreciate agriculture

and what they go through to further crops. - No doubt. - Yeah. - And so after you graduated from college, what was the first job out of there?

- Well, during college, I worked for my brother bill at Curtin Call Communications. It was a radio page, you know, a beeper company and I was a sales guy and I really liked selling and helped establish a team of four sales people there

at that company during college and it was a family company. I did learn a ton about what it takes to be a sales person and be successful and it was back in the day you had yellow pages, right?

- Yeah. I opened up yellow pages and started calling service companies and calling health health care companies like UW Madison and Dean Clinic and St. Mary's and selling more patriots.

So it was good. - Wow. - That's for instance, yeah. So you mentioned health care.

“Is that sort of how you pivoted more into health care?”

How did that come about? - Well, and Toco was first formed for telephone answering services. So telephone answering service call centers our father, my dad, was a great innovator

and back in the early '50s, he invented some systems to replace the phone company systems. And he couldn't really sell any of that. He could make it for his own company but he couldn't really sell any of that until 1976

when there was a Carter phone decision which allowed interconnection of private equipment to the phone company network. 1976 launched Amtalko for the first 15 years that I worked there.

It was in the telephone answering service sales area

and we were always looking for a different vertical

and when she know at some hospitals back in the early '90s wanted to give their doctors more privileges. So they started their own telephone answering services inside hospitals. So I was fortunate enough to sell a few of those

and my eyes went like, well, all the communications that's needed inside healthcare. And that showed us, I was able to see the operator services inside hospital, the consoles that handle all the cool calls, all those critical calls and how expeditiously

those operators have to handle those calls and become and collected and just help get that critical code out there to the staff to help the patient. So that really wasn't eye-opener and it really got us started in healthcare.

- Yeah, and so yeah, you mentioned 1976 is sort of that pivotal moment. So you've been with Amtalko over 46 years now. So obviously you made your way up all the way to CEO. Tell us a little bit about that journey.

- Well, that journey, yeah, it took a little bit of time. And it's a family company I have brothers and sisters that work there, that used to work there. I still have sisters that own telephone answering services.

the United States came back to Wisconsin

where our corporate headquarters is and became a sales manager. I managed a few people on the West Coast for selling telephone answering service and then, like I said around 15 years later,

I saw this vertical healthcare. And at that time, we had a CEO, a Joe Everley, and he was a very good mentor for me. And he would, you know, he just listened and saw the marketplace and saw the opportunity.

And he said, "Tom, hire some more salespeople "and go after this vertical and let's see what happens." And then the rest is history. - Wow. - And one in that journey, whether it was this young man

or perhaps your father. - Oh. - Yeah, who kind of helped to see who you could be. Like, we believe in young Tom here that he, one day will be the CEO.

“- I think it was, well, Joe Everley, who was the CEO.”

And then also, we had a consultant, her name was Christina Collins. And she had worked for a telephone answering service but then went into healthcare. And so she knew what our solutions did

and how they helped with the patient experience, help with the calls and she saw that I was, hey, it started to sell some hospitals, our solutions. And she really, really just gave me a lot of confidence and we had great conversations about healthcare

and what's needed in healthcare. And she was, she's just really lifted me. - Yeah, that's cool.

- Yeah, you never meet a successful person

who didn't have someone like her in their life or your CEO before you. So what's daily life like as a CEO of Amtelco? I think a lot of people, I think one of the reasons we have such a broad listenership

and so many people listen and put us at top 10.

“Globally is people want to know, you know,”

well, what's the like to be CEO? So what's your daily life like? - Well, let's see here. - May 10 meetings, we have, you know, development and implementation specialists

and solutions, architects, system engineers. So I tend meetings, but not also on those meetings, we have beta site meetings where we have customers that are testing on software for us. I attend those meetings and listen to their feedback

and how our people are working. But most of the time, I'm just listening to our leaders and their teams and how they're doing, you know, I know that, you know, when I was selling and I actually had

I was a manager for my sister and it's sort of tough to do to be a manager for another family member, I have. But she bought me a painting which is of a very colorful painting

of a Navajo, Native American woman out in the desert with a beautiful jar of water on her head that she's carrying. I think it's called, they looked it out and it's called on Oya, Oya.

So that was a beautiful gift.

And basically, that's I think what I do best

as a CEO is bring the water to the troops. So whatever that water is, you know, if they need more resources, if they need, you know, to expand their budget, you know, my job is to make them successful.

- Yeah, love it. - Yeah. - That's great. I like that as a great visual as well. Tell us, one or two things about M. Telco that most people may not know.

- Okay, one thing for sure, it thinks giving a few days before Thanksgiving, we give a frozen turkey to each employee. So that's a tradition from the very start.

“And I don't know if that's what you're getting at it.”

If it's that off a wall kind of thing. - No, no, that's, that's good too. And that goes back to the culture. And you know, I was gonna mention earlier, you know, I saw you interact, you know,

during a social time with all these customers. Everyone knew you, you're, you're so approachable, you're, you're so kind, you're, you're, you're in there. You're not like some CEOs who may separate themselves, you know, and stay separated.

And they want to do that and they want to be that way, but you're not that type of leader, or, you know, the people's people, you know, if you will. But yeah, I think people know M.Telco, you know, they may only know M.Telco as hospital operators, as executive.

But you're much more than that. Can you talk a little bit about, maybe what else M.Telco represents? And importantly, where do you think we're headed generally with communities and capabilities?

- Right, well, we've gotten into AI with our intelligent virtual agent that we call Ellie.

and we're, and we're going, you know, AI and the future, it's so fascinating, so good with fascinating.

“But you have to really take a step back and go,”

okay, we're dealing with people, patients, families, and operators, and you put that all together, and you still need to have the human to human element. And you need just have that available. So, Ellie, our IBA is there to help.

Those operators, with the mundane calls that are just, you know, I need to cancel my appointment. - Yeah, sure. - Cancel your appointment. So, the operators are free to handle those code calls,

those critical calls, and just have that more,

you know, that human element that's needed for patient information calls, you know, I need you to just transfer me to my son's room. And so, but those repetitive calls, IBAs are great for, and we need to keep those other calls

going to, to humans, you know, that personal touch. - Yeah. - Well, it's, it's, this balance Ed of mixing in technology, and that's how it is always been with us, with the call center business.

You know, we, we always know that we're in business because of those operators, handling calls, and doing them, handling those calls so well. But we need to always take a look at technology, and one is the right time to give a balance

of that technology with that human element. So, it is a fascinating, in any time.

“And, you know, people ask, you know, what's your five-year plan?”

You know, and yes, we have a great role in math, but we have to be very nimble to at all times. - Yeah. - Yeah, that's great. It is, yeah, it's just smiling 'cause I've heard those,

sort of questions before, and you're right, anyone who thinks they can predict five years from now, kind of, you know, probably not going to be close, but what's important is to have these principles that you, that you are espousing, you know,

and that it's the human first, and you use AI to augment

some of the work, and, and so that those are good principles to happen, you're right, 'cause the tech is rapidly advancing, changing all the time, and so you've got to be agile and nimble to work with it. And at the same time, the heart and soul of humanity

and who you are as a company. So, I think that's a very sage insights. So, Tom, you had this stellar growth. And so, I know our listeners will be curious, like, what are one or two skills that have enabled your growth?

So, you became, you started as a salesperson, and you now you're the CEO. Certainly, there's a couple of skills that probably were common along the way that helped you become the leader you are.

Well, that's a great question too. Yeah, skills. Number one is recognizing that you're not gonna be successful unless your customers are successful. And, and that means working with your customers,

and really, I think listening, you know, very intensely to what your customers need to have. Yeah, those are very simple things, but, you know, we've had, for the most part, 90% organic growth, which we're very proud of.

Yeah. And that comes from listening to our customers. Our customers know what we should be doing, a lot better than we do. So, we just, we like to listen,

and then, like we just brought up the nimble, every one of our customers does something a little bit different. Yes. And so, we don't do custom software.

We just integrate what they do into our software. So, everybody has that same amount of opportunity. Yeah. No, I like that. Yeah, and you're right.

“What makes those examples or key skills for leadership?”

So, nice is, it doesn't require PhD. It's just common sense, right? Listening to people and having their best interest in mind for their success or their organization. But sometimes for whatever reason, we forget it.

Now, I'm certainly along the way, not everything has gone perfectly. Can you talk about a time that you learned something in the hard way? Well, even in health care,

there's been ups and downs economically. So, a couple times over the last 46 years, there's been downturns in health care. And, you know, it taught us that, you know, we have to learn from those lessons

that you always have to be prepared

for a downturn in the economy too. So, we're a solid company, and we've managed to, you know, be a good profitable company, which our customers want. And if there is a rainy day, we're prepared for it.

But we're so blessed that through all these times, we've, you know, our average 10 years

So, even though we went through a couple of tough times, along with health care,

“we've managed to keep that knowledge base”

within the company that would just huge. Yeah, no, that's really good. All right, what about, you know, you described the idea like growing up, but surely there was something

that your parents may be forced you to do, and maybe you did a eye roll or something, like, oh my gosh, but looking back, you're glad they made you do it. All right, great question.

One thing that I'm sure a lot of kids had to do was either peas on their plate, which was, but just, okay, you decide, if you're a very good thing that I did with my parents was near Christmas time,

“our customers with the telephone answering service,”

we would go out and deliver presents to a lot of our customers. So, we'd jump in a station way again and drive around the city and deliver packages.

And we'd also drop off twice to the children's hospital, too, right around Christmas time. So, that was a very meaningful. Yeah. Yeah, that's great.

Yeah, it teaches you something to be very thankful for the things that you have and you're thankful for your health and seeing other people's situations, just reminds you sometimes to be grateful

for what you have. So, Tom, this has been super insightful.

You've built an amazing company along with other people

and your family legacy, just really all about the culture. We talked about a lot of things. You're my first guest that ever said they saw Frank Sanatra live. That's awesome.

And then I love the pivotal moment in life was marrying your wife. That's good and very honorable and you've been married for it two plus years. It's pretty amazing.

We talk a lot about your career and how you started working every type of job.

So, ultimately, when you became CEO,

you could relate to everyone in your organization and know what they were like. And we did talk more about Amtelco and some of the great things that you're doing specifically in healthcare

and sort of where you're headed to next. - So, what did we miss or is there anything? You want to double down on, I'll give you the last word. - All right, I like doubling down on our staff or leaders that we have.

“They are staff or just so important to our customers”

and they relate so well to our customers

and they do such a fantastic, just an amazing job.

So, I want to double down on giving them credit for everything, period. - Yeah. - Like I said in the very beginning and I just say this as a friend and I was there, you're seminar to speak and then run.

But yeah, you have amazing people with a 15 year tenure, some there as long as you've been there and there's just fabulous, just fun, fun people. So, Tom, thank you so much for sharing your story and Amtelco story on digital voices.

- Thank you for having me, Ad. Thank you. - Thank you for listening to digital voices. We hope today's conversation sparked ideas, reflection and connection. Subscribe on YouTube, Apple and Spotify podcast.

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