For the second straight year, Ballad Health’s Pam Austin was selected as a finalist for the Tennessee CIO ORBIE Awards, which honor chief information officers across the state who have demonstrated excellence in technology leadership.
TennesseeCIO is an organization that connects, recognizes and inspires leaders in the field. The awards recognize technology executives for leadership, innovation and excellence – as selected by their CIO peers.
Austin, senior vice president and chief information officer for Ballad Health, was one of four finalists in the Large Corporate category (up to $2.5 billion in annual revenue), along with Haden McWhorter of Premise Health, Joel Tracy of IMC and Mike Ward of Covenant Health. IMC’s Tracy was chosen as the ORBIE winner for the category at the annual Tennessee ORBIE Awards in May.
NOTE: Eastman’s Aldo Noseda, who serves on Ballad Health’s board of directors, was the overall winner in the Global category of the 2024 ORBIE Awards.
During Austin’s tenure as Ballad Health CIO, she has overseen the organization’s transition to Epic as its electronic medical record system, as well as replacing 16,000 PCs across the system to get ready for Epic. At the same time, Ballad Health migrated from Windows 7 to Windows 10, itself a massive transition. All this happened on the heels of the merger that created Ballad Health, and in the throes of the COVID pandemic.
“This once again shines a little bit of light on the tremendous work Pam and our entire IT team have been doing.” — Marvin Eichorn
“Pam is so deserving of this recognition,” said Marvin Eichorn, Ballad Health’s chief administrative officer. “This once again shines a little bit of light on the tremendous work she and our entire IT team have been doing.
“Information technology is so critical to our success as a health system. It’s important for us to find and use the right technology for the job, and to get the most out of that technology. And then just as crucial is keeping our information safe in today’s environment of constant cyberattacks. We’re blessed to have someone of Pam’s character and leadership skills as chief information officer, and to have such a great IT team overall.”
CIOs were recognized in six categories, based on the size and scope of their organization and responsibilities. There are more than 200 InspireCIO Leadership Network organizations across Tennessee, with 120 CIOs nominated across a range of industries – not just in healthcare.
Only 24 were selected as finalists, and there were six winners selected as CIO of the year – one per category.
Click here to see a special section in the Nashville Business Journal about the ORBIES, presented in PDF format.
