Shannan Bolton Drives Change with Empathy at Stanford Health Care

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Over nearly fourteen years and four different roles at Stanford Health Care, Shannan Bolton has ensured the vitality and economic viability of one of the nation’s premier academic medical centers and home to pioneering medical innovations, like the first successful adult human heart transplant. Stanford Health Care is a go-to destination for complex care, difficult medical procedures, more notably in the areas of cardiology, neurology, ear, nose, and throat.

Bolton has ascended throughout her career overseeing charge capture, clinical documentation improvement, coding, and revenue integrity to her current role as vice president of revenue cycle optimization and performance excellence. The VP says she’s gotten to her present role by being willing to question traditional workflows and a readiness to go down the rabbit hole of tweaking long-time practices in favor of efficiency.

“I think you’ll find I’m somewhat of a nontraditional vice president, because I still like to get down into the weeds,” Bolton explains. “I’m able to leverage all my skills and roles and still have the level of visibility and optics to get things through for people, along with some of the credibility required because I’ve held these positions over my career.

“I understand the work, and I enjoy the work,” she continues. “So, I find myself getting pulled into things that I think more traditional VPs might try to avoid. It’s just about balance for me, always understanding the work, the developments, to inform my decision-making, this works well.”

The COVID-19 pandemic provided a career’s worth of learning opportunities for Bolton. The VP says that the worldwide shutdown illustrated some areas where Stanford could be more efficient.

“We can drive engagement and processes and work but not have to spend so significantly when it comes to leases and administrative buildings,” she explains. “In California, especially in the Bay Area, our spend for office space was significant. I was personally splitting time between multiple office locations, and it became evident fairly quickly that the reason we were doing certain things was because that’s how they had been done for a long time. And it was time to evolve.”

Bolton and her team examined areas that could be automated and employees who could work from home, and they engaged with operational leaders about managing sites more cost-effectively without impacting care delivery.

“When we think about a hospital-based clinic, you can optimize your revenue by also lowering the cost to collect,” Bolton says. “You can be effective in terms of services that you’re providing, meet your regulatory requirements and challenge the current state. This simply requires communication and careful consideration when providing feedback and recommendations. I often find myself flowing into multiple areas, bypassing traditional lines/boundaries throughout revenue cycle. It’s incredibly interesting work.”

She says during her twenty-five-year career, she’s seen and driven an incredible amount of change in the revenue cycle space. Bolton wants her team to be as open to the pursuit of change as she has been. She’s more focused than ever on helping her team examine their own skillsets, charting where they want their own careers to go, and how she can help them up-skill to get where they want to be.

Cultivating that relationship relies on honesty and transparency. Bolton lauds Stanford’s HR department for a check-in process they previously implemented, that was conducted at the top of every week.

“We talk about what we love and what we loathed from the previous week,” the VP explains. “It’s very easy for people to talk about what they love. But it can make people very vulnerable and uncomfortable to talk about the things that are challenging for them. But what I found that process was that maybe there are people who love what you loathe, and vice versa, and it provides the arena to help people partner to engage in work they find more fulfilling. You can’t have those discussions without trust, though. And it’s something I’ve tried hard to foster on my own team.”

Bolton, like so many leaders, is also grappling with the best way to implement AI. She says her approach is integration for tasks, not for specific roles. Her goal for her team is to embrace AI that eliminates tedious and repetitive work. The time they gain can be spent upskilling their own abilities to become future leaders for the organization. Bolton isn’t looking to eliminate employees with AI; she wants to provide more meaningful experiences for her team whenever possible.

Her title is well-earned. Bolton cites her tenure at Truman Medical Center in Kansas City as the crucible that forged her expertise. She weathered a corporate integrity agreement at a time when federal scrutiny over healthcare fraud was intensifying. The experience demanded a careful balancing of government compliance with operational efficiency. It’s where she got full exposure to all aspects of revenue cycle, from patient intake to reimbursement. It was also an incredible learning experience in change management, creating resilience through uncertainty that proved an invaluable skill in the rest of her career.

“I’m grateful for Shannan’s mentorship and the profound impact she has on those around her,” says Natalie Klotsche, executive vice present of revenue performance solutions at R1. “Shannan embodies leadership excellence in healthcare, pioneering innovative strategies that ensure Stanford Health Care remains a beacon of medical advancement and excellence. Her remarkable ability to navigate complex challenges with precision and strategic acumen makes her a standout leader in her field, setting a benchmark for others to follow.”

As Bolton continues to lean into her role as a mentor and guide, she’s conscious of her daughter and niece who are maturing into their own lives. They’ve likely looked up to Bolton as an example of a woman of color excelling in a corporate environment where diversity can sometimes be hard to see. Bolton says she relishes the opportunity to be a mentor, an inspiration, and an example of how far a girl who grew up in Missouri and Tennessee can grow her career.

Bolton is a unicorn—perfect blend of technical acuity mixed with deep empathy for people. And she continues to evolve, like the best leaders do. 

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