Laurie Brubaker

In 2005, Laurie Brubaker, an upper-manager for the insurance conglomerate Aetna, had the foresight and leadership qualities necessary to take on an initiative that would end up serving over 250,000 new members in thirty sates within two years of beginning her program. Recognizing an un-tapped market of up to 20 million people with inadequate insurance and another 45 million not insured at all, Brubaker took it upon herself to start what would become a very successful business venture with the added outcome of significant social impact (Govindarajan & Trimble, 2010 p.1). We will explore how Brubaker successfully navigated both politically and structurally within Aetna to bring about a successful innovation initiative. By employing skills
High performers are great individually, but when introduced into a group, they could fit together like a puzzle or explode like sticks of dynamite. Brubaker had to be ready for either. By hand-picking the dedicated team and being very selective, she had the opportunity to share her vision with every member before they accepted, thereby stemming any potential issue well before it could manifest itself. It is this core group of high performers that sets the tone for other members or shared staff that helps out. This varsity team has to be rock solid and able to communicate effectively amongst each other, up and down the chain of command, within the division, and to their peers. Brubaker set the example by being transparent to the company and showing her dedication to the group and all the members, full or part time, revealing the foundation of her leadership and how that ties into her personal VABE’s. (2012, Clawson)
The book, “Level Three Leadership,” defines VABE’s as ones: values, assumptions, beliefs, and expectations. (Clawson, 2012, p.26) These core ideas are what guide our decisions and leadership styles. Leading by example, putting the group before yourself, making sure the troops eat first, all stem from the rationale that one’s VABE’s shapes their leadership. From the beginning, Brubaker
These meetings were designed by our executives to enhance the effectiveness of middle management as they relate to their employees; giving the employees voice and an avenue to share ideas and strategies for improvement back up the chain to upper management. Unfortunately, this only worked for about a month.
Our leaders began to treat the monthly town hall meetings as gripe sessions and openly displayed their disdain for the burden of hosting the event. As to follow our leaders, most employees started to view them as a waste of time, an interruption in productive work, and ultimately worthless. The leadership did not value suggestions, constructive criticism, or care to hear potentially great ideas on how to improve our teams. What started out as a great innovative idea, died and never was able to flourish into what was envisioned by our