24    Cone Health Philanthropy
internships offer professional-skills training and shadowing 
for students from four counties. The goal is to cultivate a 
workforce that is skilled, diverse and deeply connected to the 
communities we serve, and to give graduates a tangible path 
into employment and ongoing development at Cone Health.
Developing the workforce from within 
As powerful as these early pathways are, strengthening the 
workforce also means supporting the people who already 
work within it. That work begins in the classrooms, both 
in-person and virtual, of Cone Health University, where 
employees are learning to navigate a health-care landscape 
increasingly defined by value-based care.
Chief People and Culture Officer Michelle Adamolekun 
leads the teams responsible for Cone Health’s workforce 
development — recruiting new talent, supporting current 
employees and strengthening the culture that helps people 
grow. She came to Cone Health in 2021 because of its focus 
on value-based care and community.
“Cone Health is deeply embedded in the community, and 
that mission resonated with me,” she says. “What really 
drew me here was the culture. Cone Health has been very 
intentional and deliberate about what differentiates us in our 
region, our community and nationally. We’re not the biggest 
health system, but our culture sets us apart. We are focused 
strategically on making sure we provide care that is truly 
valuable to our community members.”
Value-based care is changing the 
health-care experience in practice. 
Cone Health and its partners — including insurers — are 
working together to build a variety of community programs, 
technology platforms and payment models that make 
prevention the priority. A patient might come in for a heart 
check, and her care team also makes sure she has healthy 
food, can afford her medicine and knows who to call for 
follow-up. In a school clinic, a student can see a provider 
virtually and have their pediatrician looped in that same 
day. Every part of the system works together, so care feels 
personal and easier to navigate. 
It’s not an overnight shift. It takes time — and it takes 
training.
This is where Cone Health University, the health system’s 
internal learning and development hub, plays a crucial role. 
Leadership courses, clinical training, coaching and tuition 
support help team members gain the knowledge they 
need to advance, adapt and deliver care in an environment 
increasingly defined by prevention and value. Cone 
Health University offers systemwide training that deepens 
employees’ understanding of value-based care and how to 
deliver it.  
“It’s really important that our team members understand 
what value-based care means,” Adamolekun explains. “It’s 
not a thing — it’s how we do things. Cone Health University 
helps us create a uniform understanding of how we 
exemplify value-based care and connect it to our patients. 
We are working to explain value-based care at all levels — to 
define it, educate our teams about it and embed it across 
the system so it becomes a natural part of how we work.”
A community effort behind care
Sustaining this kind of workforce transformation requires 
more than training modules and curriculum updates; it 
also calls for the steady partnership of a community that 
understands what’s at stake. Value-based care depends 
on people who can listen closely, think ahead and act with 
empathy. Preparing a workforce to do that at scale — with 
programs that embed them 
in the communities and go 
beyond standard care — is not 
something a health system can 
shoulder alone.
“In this shortage environment, 
we need support and 
partnership to enrich our 
workforce-development 
programming,” Adamolekun 
says. “Left unchecked, the 
shortage of health-care 
workers will impact the health 
of our community. We have 
to ensure we’ve got the right 
people at the right time at the 
right place to deliver care. If we can bridge the gaps in the 
shortage environment, then access becomes real. Instead 
of waiting two or three months for an appointment, we can 
do it sooner.”
Cone Health University elevates learning systemwide, 
equipping every team member — from frontline caregivers 
to leaders — with the skills and mindset to deliver smarter, 
more connected, value-based care. 
Danielle Swartz, vice president of population health and 
value-based care, is part of the Cone Health team helping 
Care by 
design
SEE JEAN PATZ 
 and her classmates 
in the latest CMA 
graduation video.

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