Board Member Guest Blogs: Terri Coppersmith

In preparation for an upcoming series on Moving Forward through Change, SOREDI’s Executive Committee was asked to share a few thoughts on change: professional and personal. Terri Coppersmith, SOREDI Board President, and Vice President of Finance at Plexis, started off the responses.

• What is the biggest change your company has made during the past 20 months?

The most impactful and substantial change that PLEXIS Healthcare Systems has made over the last 20 months involves the move from a brick-and-mortar headquarters facility in Ashland to a completely virtual business environment online. Due to the restraints of the COVID-19 lockdown rules, PLEXIS accomplished a complete physical relocation of workspace from a collaborative community of offices and cubicles to a home environment facilitating business transactions of every type and scale. For almost any business experiencing this sort of fundamental shift, the potential for catastrophic disruption is significant.  However, a large contingent of PLEXIS employees already work remotely from their home offices and the remaining facility workforce were provided careful guidance during the transition that kept them in close contact with their supervisors while giving thoughtful advice as to how to maintain high levels of morale and productivity while working from home. It’s a tribute to the resiliency, creativity, and pride of our “Plexicans” that the transition happened with near seamless efficiency.

• Do you foresee more economic changes coming for your business/industry?

PLEXIS will be continually optimizing our business strategy to capitalize off what some might call a worldwide paradigm shift in the procedure, efficiency, and economy of health care delivery.  The necessity of improvisation brought on by the social restrictions of COVID-19 and related variant containment has placed the transition to automated and digitized business transactions at a very high priority. “Doing more with less” is becoming a more popular aphorism in the healthcare payer community as the search turns to enterprise administrative software platforms to accomplish more ancillary healthcare payer tasks within the core administrative platform framework while automating more of the menial adjudication-related back-office tasks. Digitization and automation remain large and influential drivers of success for enterprise core administrative solutions providers like PLEXIS Healthcare Systems.

• How have you been able to react to change on a personal level?

Personally, I am a disciple of the NIKE philosophy of “Just Do It”. If there is one thing about change that is unchanging, it is that there will always be more change. And, as a leader, my personal philosophy and practicum regarding change must always follow the goals and ideals of a “Change Manager” for myself and for the team. This means understanding that change involves an adjustment process that must be navigated thoughtfully. It also means paying attention to how myself and others ride the “Change Curve” through the phases of denial, resistance, commitment, and exploration. Perhaps the short answer to this question might be “when it comes to change, winners PRO-act instead of RE-act”. The close adherence to NIKE’s slogan “Just Do It” and my professional experience has allowed me to discover unprecedented flexibility, increased focus, and productivity, not to mention other significant advantages of working remotely and video conferencing over the past two years.

• What do you think about the changes SOREDI has made? (Shifting focus to grants, etc.)

SOREDI is almost an entirely new organization from just a few years ago. SOREDI served Southern Oregon businesses large and small for several years with a “boots on the ground” approach to helping them survive and thrive with events, networking initiatives, promotional opportunities, as well as vital government/commercial teamwork programs led by our enthusiastic, knowledgeable, and experienced staff.  Recently, we’ve celebrated a transition to a more focused approach to help Southern Oregon businesses obtain much needed grants and loans during the hard times brought about by COVID-19 restrictions, and the devastating wildfires. We’ve also worked hard to restructure and optimize our financials and back-office efficiencies. The SOREDI web site also has an impressive new look and functionality. But the improvement I am most proud of is the augmentation of SOREDI’s staff of savvy professionals with a more diverse profile of team members laser-focused on the specific power-points of growth that Southern Oregon businesses need to succeed in our rapidly evolving worldwide business environment.

• Can you provide a favorite quote on change?

“There is nothing permanent except change” – Heraclitus

Thank you for sharing, Terri!