E2A 097 Collaborative Authorship: Writing with Multiple Contributors with Hanna Boëthius and Dr. Verena Voelter 

Episode Transcript

Please note: The transcript is produced by a third-party company from an audio recording and may include transcription errors.

Scott MacMillan

You're listening to the Entrepreneur to Author podcast. 

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Welcome to the Entrepreneur to Author podcast, the podcast that brings you practical strategies for building authority and growing your business. And now, here's your host, Scott MacMillan.

Scott:

My guests today are Hanna Boëthius and Dr. Verena Voelter. Hanna is a patient advocate and international speaker with deep expertise in health coaching and systems change.

Verena is a trained medical doctor and global health care strategist who's worked across the pharma and life sciences sectors, and together they've co-edited The Next Tango, a patient guide, all you need to know to deliver great results in health care, a project that brings together voices from across the health care ecosystem to reimagine what truly collaborative value-based care can look like. Verena and Hanna, welcome. Thanks so much for joining us.

Hanna Boëthius:

Thank you so much for having us. Wow. That was an impressive intro.

Scott:

Well, you know, I'm excited to have you both here, although I gave a bit of a brief intro. I'd love to hear it from you directly. Could you share a little bit about your respective backgrounds and what led you to collaborate on this book?

And Hanna, maybe we'll start with you.

Hanna:

Maybe we'll start with me. Perfect. Thank you so much.

This is such an exciting opportunity to share the word about our, you know, labor of love, to put it that way.

But yes, I'm a very much patient advocate at heart. I was diagnosed with type 1 diabetes when I was two years old. So I basically know of nothing else.

And instead of hating on it, I've made it my friend, or at least tried to, in every sort of aspect of my life. So anything from I have a master's, a master of science in clinical diabetes, I am a value-based health care greenbelts holder, and all of these things to really, you know, get down and dirty into the health care aspect of things, because there's so much that patients can do and people who are living with these conditions, it doesn't have to be diabetes, it's any condition. And all of us are going to be patients at some point of our lives, unfortunately.

So it's good to spread the word about what can be done, because care mostly happens at home, and not really in these healthcare institutions, and with your provider, necessarily. So my background and my motivation is really to help make people live healthier lives, to whether that is with lifestyle measures, or if I can help anyway, in a sort of more systemic, systematic way, in terms of whole healthcare. And this is what drives me, this is what gets me up in the mornings.

And also in the past few years, I've been doing a fair bit of healthcare consulting, both with Verena and elsewhere. And it's something that's really exciting to see all these moving pieces of the healthcare ecosystem move and change. And it's like a complicated tango, some might say.

Scott:

That makes a lot of sense. Verena, how about you? Could you give a little bit more background of yourself, and what led you to collaborate with Hanna on this book?

Verena Voelter:

It's a very personal story, on the one hand, as a physician, practitioner, provider, 15 years in the healthcare system, in the public system, and then 12 years in the private sector, in drug development and pharmaceuticals. But really where my heart beats is what you nicely said in the introduction, it's about value creation and outcomes that really matter for the patient. And maybe that is my oncologist heart, having worked mostly with cancer patients, that I grew very close to, quote unquote, my patients and their journey, and what actually, not only the chemo we give, to be a little bit simplistic, but also what life means for a person that has received a terrible diagnosis or a less life-threatening diagnosis.

It doesn't matter because it changes our lives. And I think this is where destiny has brought Hanna and myself together to work, as she said, on the consulting front and help the different players in the Tango do more value based, patient focused work. And then eventually we said, I guess it was maybe Hanna at a cafe was like, well, why don't we write the next Tango and make it even more patient centric in this book?

Scott:

Yeah. Yeah. Well, and maybe that's a really great segue into talking a little bit more about the book itself.

Could you share a bit more about it and who have you written it for and what is your goal for them as the reader?

Hanna:

Yeah, absolutely. I would love to share more about it. And this book is really an educational tool on how to do value based healthcare in reality.

And we really aim to provide insights into what is possible when all these stakeholders within the healthcare spectrum really collaborate together. So as a little refresher, these are patients, providers, pharma, payers, and policymakers. And we all need to work together.

We can't just rely on one of them to sort things out for the rest of us. We really have to collaborate deeply together in order to move the needle on healthcare. And that is really what we're needing at this point of time.

And we also need to work towards a common goal. And as a little secret, our goal in this book is really that we're all working towards patient centricity and making sure that we're delivering these outcomes that really matter to the person who's getting the care, which is the patient. This sounds like common sense, but it hasn't really made it that far quite yet.

We're working on it though. And this book is one tool in that toolkit for that. We've also deliberately chosen to keep it kind of a lighter style so that you don't just put it down after a couple of pages.

We aim to incorporate both personal stories, evidence-based, which I also know that you have helped us collaborate on so beautifully, Scott. And making sure that both parts are in the same book. And these two parts, evidence-based and personal stories really is to, in order to give real world meaning to the sort of more theoretical parts that we're talking about.

And the goal for the reader is really to see that a shift towards a patient centric version of healthcare is necessary and even inevitable.

Verena:

I also wanted to take a step back on kind of why. So we spoke about our personal motivations, which are very strong from a deep patient and provider perspective, but also there's the system view. So we want to explore both cruising altitudes at the same time, give real meaning to patients and the other four Ps in the system, but also the collaborative system view.

And what is the problem? The problem today it's fragmented and it works in silo. So the pharmaceutical industry is over here.

The doctors and hospitals are over there. The payer and health plans and insurances are yet in another corner. Then we have health authorities like the FDA and NHS and NICE, et cetera.

And they all operate as if they would be a single entity. However, in healthcare, and I put a little bit of my business head on, this is not a B2C or B2B model. What we have is a hyper-fragmented B2B, 2B, 2B, 2B, count five, 2C model.

And it's a question of incentives. And there's all the downstream reasons that we invite our listeners to read the book. Like why, why is that so complicated?

And why is it complicated? Why can't we just say, wake up in the morning? Hey, today we collaborate and we change it.

Well, that's why it's so complicated. And we wrote the book. And then obviously the other half is, as Hanna alluded to, is very practical, hands-on ideas for solutions for every of the five actors to maybe do something different tomorrow morning when they wake up.

Scott:

Yeah. Thank you for sharing that. Because I did want to ask about all of the different perspectives that you brought together, right?

The five P's, the patients, providers, pharma, payers, and policymakers. And it's clear, Verena, from how you described the complexity of the system, why it was so important to bring all of those voices into the conversation. And Hanna, you talked about that balance between the very personal patient stories paired with very thorough evidence-based, you know, well, evidence.

How did you strike that balance between those two, what are very different types of content and different types of writing? How did you strike that balance? And, you know, why did you feel it was important to do so?

Hanna:

Well, in my slightly, of course, biased opinion, it's really because healthcare and especially caring for a chronic condition is a holistic matter. So it's not just evidence-based, it's not just the personal stories, but it's incorporating both of these things. And if we bear in mind that non-communicable diseases are going to, are predicted to rise with 70% until 2050, which is not that far away, actually, even though we like to think so, this is going to be a huge thing.

And we really need to start looking at healthcare in a more holistic way, meaning that we incorporate all the stakeholders. We also incorporate both the evidence-based and the personal stories into this great big mix. And of course, a lot of other things that we don't really have time to go into here, but we just have so much that can be done outside of the doctor's office, like I was alluding to before.

And this is still important while keeping evidence practice in the center of care. And we wanted to reflect this seesaw in the book as well, a little bit. That's why we really aim to balance this very thoroughly.

And also on a personal level, Verena and I feel like we model this doctor-patient relationship quite well in our personal relationship as well, and sort of that we are collaborative and that we do these things together. And we also wanted to show that, hey, it's not just about care, a doctor and a patient can also write a book together and gather all these amazing voices in one place.

Scott:

Yeah. Let's talk about those voices because I think that's something that's very unique about this book was the additional collaborators and you two as co-editors. What was that collaboration process like across so many different contributors?

Verena:

Yeah. So we kind of brought this next tango immediately to the next two levels because it's not only as Hanna said, the doctor-patient kind of writing a book together. How crazy is that, by the way?

But it is also we work as co-editors, as you say, Scott, and we invited in five additional voices for all those five different perspectives. And in parenthesis, that's actually the early echo that we get from our readers. It's one of the things they love most to hear those different voices.

So I think for us, it was essential this time around. That's not only us. People are maybe sick of listening to us and sorry for the listener right now because it's the two of us.

But so open up that book and you see all these other five verses. So it was very genuine and very easy. I think, Scott, to those particular five set of five authors or in one chapter, even two co-authors there, they all are strong believers in that same solution.

That we must shift towards patient-centered value. And the only way to get there is collaboration and co-creation across the silos and across the sectors. So kind of quote, unquote, convincing people to come in was like super easy.

We can talk about the publishing and writing a book piece. I don't know if that's part of the session today, which obviously is a different conversation. But conceptually, everybody was very happy to join.

Scott:

Yeah. Yeah. And I do want to talk about that aspect as well.

But I'd love to deep dive a little bit into the role that patients play as one of the five P's. I think a lot of people can think about all of the other P's and how the roles that they play in serving the patient, but the patients themselves, what role do they play in making value-based healthcare work? And what do you believe patients most wish the other four P's understood better?

Hanna:

Well, Scott, this is a loaded question and I could speak half an hour just to this one question. But of course, in my, again, slightly biased opinion, I think patients can play a huge role and they should play a huge role when it comes to designing care, because ultimately we're the ones who need it the most. But in the end, and also like we mentioned in the intro, unless you keep the end user happy, and the end user in this case of care is the patient, you have no business.

And I think we have a quote of something like if this was the margins of a CEO in the business world, quote unquote, they would be fired because it isn't that those outcomes that really matter to the end user are not really often commonly sought after. And we really find that the patient as the end user of the solution, of the medication, of the offering, of the care, of the product, whatever it might be, whether it's MedTech or vital life sustaining care, needs to fit the person. It needs to be individualized and it needs to really fit their lives also.

It can't be an extra thing. But I think that many people living with conditions, whatever type it is, would really like to be seen as equals in their care. And with that comes joint decision making power with their physicians, with their insurances, with their policymakers, with all of these other four Ps.

And again, we come back to the question of collaboration and really making sure that everyone is working on an equal level.

Scott:

Yeah, that's really that message that you share about co-creation, isn't it? Designing health care, not just for patients, but with patients. And so I wonder, what are some practical ways that the other Ps, the provider, policymaker, payer, what's another way that they can embrace that shift to more of a co-creation model?

Verena:

So one thing to echo the direct what Hanna previously said on the joint decision making power. So I want to do a shout out first to the first in row, which is a doctor, because no doctor patient relationship, no health care. So we could even put this five P down to two.

And I want to really shout out to my peer group. Take that very seriously and put your patient contact on your eyesight and same level. I am also from time to time myself in the patient role.

And I do realize that my providers and my doctors, I still to this day in June 2025, experience paternalistic behavior to me. And they know I'm a hyper qualified and trained scientist myself. And yet I'm spoken to as if I would be three years old.

This is very simple ways. It's a mindset issue. It's not a big training of 10 years issue.

It's just guys shift your mindset. This is the new era and we don't need digital for this. So when we come to the whole context, so if we take an ecosystem view into your question, Scott, what's the secret sauce and the secret glue to bring those silos together?

And this is what we described in the sixth chapter, the six P, because we're constantly asked, well, where the heck is the six P and the orchestrator to tell all these five people to work together? Well, the bad news is there is no six P, but there is a process and a blueprint and a song sheet that we borrowed from the Harvard Negotiation Project. It's a seven step.

Go and look up the scheme in the book. It's don't want to waste the time here. But I think the good news, really, and we say this to encourage everybody and not lose faith and motivation and energy because it's very frustrating in everyday life for people who work in health care.

There is really a process that works and it's very simple to say, this is why the title of the first book was It Takes Five to Tango. You need to take time to understand the other person's interests and problem and what's going on in their life. If I'm in a pharmaceutical company and believe me, I've been 12 years in those shoes and I'm going to the payer authority and I'm saying, you stupid guys, you don't understand that my drug is worth $100,000 and why are you so stupid and you don't get it?

And I'm on purpose, super like simple in my wording to be provocative. But I think that doesn't get us anywhere. It's breaking the systems even more.

The only key that we have personally experienced in our day work, applying that set of seven steps of multiparty collaboration is taking the time to listen to the other party's views, pressures, needs and interests, anchor it in the common purpose. Hey, we want to solve something actually for the patients together. We're not so far away on that.

And then basically apply that process. And that is the perfect glue that actually also works in healthcare. Surprise, surprise.

Scott:

Surprise indeed. Verena, you mentioned earlier about the publishing process. And I think for a lot of experts, there's two stages to getting a book to market.

There's the effort of sitting down and getting the ideas out of your head and working with collaborators and getting data and evidence and making sure that you ultimately write the book that you want to write. And then once the writing is done, there's the whole effort of getting the book to market. Could you guys share a little bit about your experience publishing the book?

And what should some of our listeners think about when they're thinking about getting their book, their manuscript to market?

Verena:

Well, first of all, I'm very happy this is an audio cast. So the listeners don't see my skin PTSD reaction to your question, that it was a very painful. There's no way it's going to be painful.

But how do we still keep the enthusiasm of getting our story out there and actually survive and now be in this very beautiful honeymoon, forever honeymoon of having the book in our hands? So I want to say it ties it back to what we said earlier. We were a group of authors this time.

And as much as, let's say, the amount of work and the hours of work have not necessarily reduced versus doing it alone. But my experience of being an author, and I think that's what everybody says, is the loneliness. It's terribly lonely when you are with yourself and your brain and your idea and nobody can look into your head.

This was wonderful. And I can only recommend. So not everybody can do it with a cool set of authors.

But there are other communities. And then I also wanted to say we were blessed with a unique set of endorsers that were ready to support us with, for example, testimonials. And I just want to maybe quickly cite two of them, because I think this is something that everybody can do.

Every author gets support by peer groups and by people who endorse your ideas. So, for example, Dr. Anne Ertz, who's the head of the Novartis Foundation, from a pharma angle, saying, Marina's and Hanna's focus on patient-centered partnerships that involve all actors is spot on. Only a well-coordinated dance between those five P's can catalyze the much-needed shift.

And then another one, Dr. Steve Klasko, who is really that MD entrepreneur that we advertise a lot on and who has been former CEO of Jefferson Health, says, change is necessary. It doesn't have to be scary, though. And I would apply that to the authorship, too.

Change can be creative. It can be liberating. But the one thing change cannot be is incremental.

Small random steps will not create the tangled Marina and Hanna imagine. And I think this is really as a word of encouragement to other authors, like be bold. Take big steps.

Imagine what you don't think you will ever be able to deliver and surround yourself by a group of supporters.

Scott:

Very well said.

Hanna:

That's so beautifully said. And I'd love to add two small points to that. One for the author, which is really just dare to share your vision.

If you have this and you have this burning passion inside, it needs to be seen by others. It needs to be read by a wide array of people that feel equally passionate about these topics as you do. And while it's not easy to get a book together, it's so worth it.

And seeing your name on that cover is priceless. And it's such a surreal feeling. And the second point I would like to make is really work with an amazing pro team like Grammar Factory who helped make this process a lot less painful than it really has to be.

So thank you so much for your support and your help.

Scott:

Oh, thank you for sharing that. I really appreciate that. And listen, this has been a wonderful conversation.

I want to thank you both for your time and for your work for listeners who want to learn more about the book or connect with you and learn more about what you're doing. Where should they go next?

Verena:

So get your copy on our author website, www.tangoforfive.com. By the way, another really good thing for authors to think about, get your website together. It can be very simple.

Then if you're in the system, it's like, damn, I really want to know more of how to do that myself when I wake up tomorrow morning and do something else. So consult us at our website, 5phealthcaresoolutions.com. And then also, if you want to be part of the community and the movement, as one of our testimonial supporters has said, join our annual flagship event in Zurich on 5th of September, because you will see about 100 like-minded people like Hanna and Verena on drugs and multiplied by 100 of, like, for example, the two of our testimonials, Dr. Aerts and Dr. Klasko, you know, we'll be there. Be inspired and get your dose of energy and a good drink and wake up on the following Monday to make change happen. And thank you very much, Scott, for your amazing partnership and co-creation on this second next tango.

Scott:

Oh, wonderful. Well, listen, we'll put those links in the show notes so that it's very easy for people to access them. Hanna, Verena, thank you so much for being here and for sharing your insights with such clarity and such heart.

It's been a thoughtful, energizing conversation, and I really appreciate the work that you're doing to bring more collaboration and more care into the health care conversation.

Hanna:

Thank you.

Scott:

As we wrap up this episode of Entrepreneur to Author, remember this. Now is the time. Time to write, time to publish, and time to grow.