AHLA's Speaking of Health Law

Conversation with 2019-2020 AHLA President Rob Niccolini

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Craig Hunter of Coker Group interviews AHLA President Rob Niccolini and finds out his goals for the upcoming year and what excites him in health law. Sponsored by Coker Group. 

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Speaker 1:

Hi everyone. I'm David Cade, c e o, the American Health Lawyers Association. Welcome to ALA's latest installment of its Conversations with Leadership podcast series. Today we have Craig Hunter from Coer Group interviewing ALA's newly minted president, Rob Ney Coer Group, a national healthcare advisory firm works with hospitals and physician groups to develop customized solutions and five main service areas, strategy, operations, finance, technology, and compliance group advisors have the experience and creativity to find the right solution for any market and healthcare entity.

Speaker 2:

Thanks, David. That's great. We are thrilled to, uh, be honored to this for the a h again. And, uh, Rob, congratulations, quite an honor for you.

Speaker 3:

Thank you very much.

Speaker 2:

You're the, uh, the first Labor and employment attorney to be the president of a, how did you originally get involved in the association?

Speaker 3:

So, uh, I've been involved in the HLA now for over 20 years, and it was, uh, really just happy circumstance. I got involved in the first place. I was a young associate in a very large firm. I had been doing labor employment work exclusively, but I was doing work for a number of hospitals in, uh, involved surrounding areas. And the head of our healthcare practice group, uh, reached out to me one day and said, Hey, we should get involved in the A H L A. Well, honestly, my reaction was why would I ever do that?<laugh>? Um, to me, the ALA was a, uh, was an organization for, for healthcare attorneys, specifically for healthcare regulatory attorneys, people who did Stark. And, um, and it was also an organization that was, you know, it was focused on unrepresented providers. Right. Um, but I viewed it as, you know, almost a very niche narrow organization. Um, but luckily he talked me into, uh, attending an annual meeting. It was actually down in San Antonio where my, my wife's from Texas. So we figured, oh, we, we'll go down there, there together. And, uh, and I was just blown away. I, I had no idea the scope of the hla. Um, I went to the Labor Plant Practice Group meeting. Um, met a bunch of practitioners who were, uh, just like me. They, they were labor and employment attorneys, uh, but they were representing hospitals. They were representing post-acute centers. They were representing physicians. Uh, but in addition, I also met a, a whole host of people in different areas, became friends with some people, uh, doing medical staff work, uh, friends with some people doing antitrust. And, uh, and I, I quickly realized two things. One was, uh, even as a labor and employment attorney, the HLA had a tremendous amount to offer to me. Right. Uh, but secondly, what else came to realize was being involved in the A H L A, uh, really increased my knowledge of healthcare and in practicing law representing healthcare entities. Um, and it really increased my, my connection, uh, with other colleagues in other areas who became incredibly helpful to my career. So, uh, so I got involved in Labor and Plant Practice Group, uh, ultimately became the chair. Uh, and then about eight years ago, uh, I came on the board and it's been, uh, uh, hands down one of the best things of my professional life

Speaker 2:

That's outstanding years. It's, uh, an accomplishment, uh, from a timing standpoint, how you seen the organization

Speaker 3:

You're making old right now, so<laugh>. Um, so, uh, so the ALA has just, uh, continued to grow and thrive, uh, over 20 years. As I said before, I think originally in our history, we were mainly focused on, on representing the providers. So specifically representing hospitals and health systems. Uh, you know, now our members are working really in every facet, uh, of healthcare plans as well as providers, uh, physicians, uh, medical device, pharma, the massive consulting world out there. So I've seen our, our membership diversify. I've, I've seen the clients and companies and individuals we represent diversify, uh, and I've just seen the organization continue to grow.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, that's great. Uh, from, uh, your involvement now as the president, I know normally there are some specific goals and objectives that presidents come in with. You. Tell us a little bit about what, why they're passionate for

Speaker 3:

You. Absolutely. And, uh, Dave and I always talk about the fact that, uh, just cause the new president comes in, uh, we have strategic directives and initiatives for the organization. So we, we try not to have presidential goals. That organization, I did come in with goals all three. We've tried to integrate strategic plan and direction of the organization. Um, the first is what I've referred to as strategic integration of our committee system. David, over the last several years, has done a, uh, a real good functional reorganization, uh, of the HLA in terms of staff alignment to make us much more efficient and effective in meeting members needs. We, in the last year on the board ha have addressed that from governance perspective, and we changed our committee structure to match with the functional re organization. And, uh, and we like to say this the first year we're, you know, kinda taking the training wheels off, right? Uh, and taking the bike for a ride. So, uh, one thing we're really focused on this year is, is working with my committee chairs, uh, to make sure that the, the board is working in a strategic way in alignment with the, with everything our wonderful staff is doing. My, my second goal is that the board this year is really taking a hard look at our value proposition and lots changing in the healthcare industry, lots changing in the legal industry. And we wanna make sure that what we're offering to our members is not only what our members want, but what they need, you know, what they need to, uh, practice on a day in and day out basis. And so, as the, uh, as the industry evolves, we're trying to make sure that we're evolving with an organization, uh, to meet our member needs. And then my, uh, final goal for the year, we actually in, in Boston, uh, in June this year, uh, launched something called the taskforce. It is a, uh, collection of leaders in the organization and former leaders, uh, who have agreed to take a year and take a real deep dive on what is occurring in the healthcare industry, specifically in the health law industry, and what we anticipate the industry is gonna look like by, um, I'm firm believer, Craig, that we are really cusp some ways at the precipice of massive changes. Lot of changes, yeah. Um, and especially in the legal, uh, industry, um, they include, uh, developments and technology, specifically ai. Uh, they include more and more legal services being provided by, those don't necessarily have a law degree or, or practice in a traditional legal setting. They involve, you know, continuing pressure and issues in the healthcare industry, which of course is gonna impact the health law professionals who are, who are supporting that industry. So that, uh, that task force is running report to the board at our midyear board meeting in national in January, and then our annual meeting in San Diego next June of 20. It'll be providing a final report, not just on the change we anticipate over the next address all issues.

Speaker 2:

That's great. First decision was the committee, uh, came together at the annual meeting in Boston. And what size is the committee and of those

Speaker 3:

Involved? So, so actually don't call it a committee. Ok, sorry. No, no. It's, uh, it's a task force taskforce. I, I'm, I'm a big believer in taskforce cause they have a limited, life committees tend to live forever. That's right. So, uh, so the taskforce was created with a, with a one year lifespan. Um, so we could very efficiently address these issues. I, I don't want this study going on for years and years. As I said, I like task forces because they're limited life and they can also be very small and nimble. So, uh, believe it or not, our task taskforce only has four members on it. Right. Are doing, they're surveys firms. So those members are, are really resources, task

Speaker 2:

Sources. There are certain set of challenges that you see on the horizon. So you mentioned a couple, you wanna expand on that little bit? Give us some of things you see from an organizational standpoint in order to continue thrive and future need specifically challenges.

Speaker 3:

Absolutely. I think all of the challenges, and, and there are a lot of them, but they, in my opinion, I'll come down to one thing, which is marketplace for the provision Legal services is changing reason. That's need to provide services, lower cost. And so many of the developments that are occurring now are related to that. And, and we've been seeing that now in healthcare for, you know, the last 10 or 20 years. Um, you know, healthcare is under tremendous pressure, uh, to provide better quality medical services, uh, to provide better quality medical services to a larger population, but yet somehow to IT with less money. And, and the only way you can do that is by achieving efficiencies. Well, the same thing's happening in the legal industry. And so a lot of the, the developments that are occurring, I think are all, you know, driven by the marketplace, driven by simple economics, which is how can we provide better service, uh, to the healthcare industry, um, of a legal nature, but in a more efficient way. And, uh, law firms, consulting companies, pretty much anyone providing legal services, um, are looking at a lot of different possibilities. Uh, one continues to be technology and, and not only the use of technology to be more efficient, uh, but also the use of ai. And, you know, AI has been used in a lot of areas in healthcare. Uh, radiology is one of them. Um, it's now being used on a test basis throughout the country in the legal industry. Um, my firm, which obviously is labor employment specialty firm, we we're now using AI on a test basis in several states, uh, to actually help us analyze lawsuits against providers and plans, um, and help us prepare discovery and litigation's interesting. AI is doing in 10 work of what we should take an associate paralegal 40 hours. Um, the second area,

Speaker 2:

<laugh>, we're in Baltimore and we're near the, there's just no way to, no way to hide the big horn blowing in the background. And

Speaker 3:

Here, here, I thought, thought that was a, uh, a signal. I was just talking too long. That's, that's true. Um, so it's very efficient for our clients, but it creates some real challenges for how do you, uh, how do you react to that. But the second area, where's it's really occurring and, and again, something that we healthcare, which is provision of professional services by, by non-traditional professionals, um, this the same way that, uh, family primary care medical services are to an extent now being provided by physician assistance, by nurses, by a lot of legal services now are being provided by those who aren't necessarily jds. Um, and that's not, that's not a bad thing. That that's, that's just simple economics. Um, there is still, and, and always will be a role for lawyers, uh, in health law and, and in providing legal services. But lawyers aren't necessarily gonna be doing everything that they used to be doing.

Speaker 2:

I, I agree. I think that spot on. Well, tell us a bit about yourself. Outside of what, what do you for are of your hobbies?

Speaker 3:

I'm lawyer. I'm,

Speaker 2:

Uh, incident between Ravens and the Browns

Speaker 3:

<laugh>. So, so as you know, I'm actually, I'm a huge Ravens fan. Uh, one of our board members is from Cleveland. Uh, so we've had a lot of discussions, uh, this year and, uh, lot of people know, but our CEO David is unfortunately Pittsburgh Steel. So,

Speaker 2:

Uh, all the same division get you guys just beating up on each

Speaker 3:

Other. Exactly. Yeah. Yet we remain collegial. There you go. Uh, so as I said, I'm a raven. I love football. Um, I also have bit of hobby. Um, I've been a lawyer my whole life, but even longer I've interest in magic.

Speaker 2:

Yeah.

Speaker 3:

Really. Yeah, I'm, I'm actually an amateur magician. Um, have been my whole life. Uh, I, I do a lot of magic for, how

Speaker 2:

Did I not know this?<laugh>

Speaker 3:

I'm a lawyer. I'm good secret

Speaker 2:

Work. Like see that out a conference anytime soon.

Speaker 3:

So have actually over the years, uh, when I've spoken at different events performed, uh, performed magic, um, I, I find that if I do at that at the beginning, I tend to actually get better, uh, better reviews. Uh, actually the current president of the, uh, Maryland chapter of the Society of American Magicians, um, and for the last five years

Speaker 2:

Really. Um, you mentioned your wife is from Texas. Any other hobbies, things you, things that you even see in your personal life that apply to your professional life?

Speaker 3:

Well, um, so I, I'm lucky enough, I, I met my wife in college. Um, we've been married question

Speaker 2:

Magic as well,

Speaker 3:

But we, uh, uh, we have three wonderful kids. Uh, my kids are, uh, my two boys are 17 and 20, my daughter's and Interesting book. Um, so actually, uh, one of our former presents, Eric Zimmerman, um, who is, uh, at McDermott in, uh, in DC uh, Eric gave several of us of us a book who in leadership, wonderful book. It's called The Presidents Club. It's actually, uh, uh, the history of the ex-presidents in the United States, uh, dating all the way back to Hoover and, um, how they formed this unofficial president's club since they're the only ones who can understand the pressures president. And uh, uh, some really interesting things I didn't know such as, um, bill Clinton and Nixon actually became great friends after, um, after the presidencies. Uh, some connections that you would never think were there. Those, yeah. But it's, uh, it's a wonderful book. Highly recommend.

Speaker 2:

Ok. Well, before we wrap, get a little bit more involved or, um, assume or approach the subject of becoming involved in some of the committees of leadership ab

Speaker 3:

Absolutely. Um, you know, over the last five years, um, I'm very proud to say that has really focused on the, of diversity and inclusion. We've really made it, uh, one of our strategic initiatives and strategic goals. Uh, we said for years we're really trying to build diversity inclusion into the DNA of our organization. Um, what I found over the years is that as an organization, we really best when we make sure everyone's a seat at the table, make sure that everybody's voice is heard in the organization. Um, so what I would urge for, for all the, the young lawyers out there, all the young health law professionals, um, you know, anyone who's interested in health law at all is, um, come to a meeting, reach out to leaders, um, offer your services. Um, I think you'll be very surprised to find out that if you do, we have a place for you Absolutely. In

Speaker 2:

Yeah. I would even add to that. We've experienced have been somewhat reluctant to even submit abstracts to potentially speak just cause they, they're not confident they worth they're presentations. But what I've, it's tremendous opportunity<affirmative>, it's a very collegial group and it's very close group and try to stand to work with you guys. Any closings or.