Julie N.

Julie Novak didn't set out to spend more than three decades at the Michigan State Medical Society.

She didn't set out to become its first female CEO, either.

Five years into her career, she'd landed in health care policy “quite by accident” and was looking for a place to grow. She found one.

“I had ambition, but I never thought about where it would all lead to or how long I would stay,” she told me. “I just kept following the next thread, pun intended.”

Turns out that's a pretty good description of Julie.

Building the muscles

By the time I met Julie, she knew health care and health policy better than almost anyone I'd encountered. She could take a complicated problem, strip away the noise and get to what actually mattered.

Facts. Common sense. Move.

What I didn't know was how much of that confidence had been built over time.

Developing her own leadership philosophy, thinking strategically and actively pushing for change were, as she describes them, “muscles I had to build for myself.”

When she became CEO, she inherited an organization that needed significant change just as the Great Recession collided with shifting demographics and changing health care business models.

Her technical term for the combination?

“A trifecta of heartburn.”

She listened first. Then she acted.

Some decisions were painful. Some weren't popular. But Julie learned that eventually a leader has to decide.

“You never have perfect information,” she said. “At some point you have enough to choose a direction and begin to move.”

And perhaps more importantly: “Making no choice is a choice, and usually not for the better.”

Finding her own voice

Julie was the first woman to lead MSMS, something particularly significant in a profession historically dominated by men.

She'd grown up believing the glass ceiling had already been broken. Becoming CEO occasionally reminded her otherwise.

“There are definitely moments when I felt I was being judged or interpreted differently than a man would have been in my role,” she said.

Rather than pretending she had all the answers, Julie built a network around herself: a mentor, an executive coach and a CEO peer group.

That peer group delivered one particularly satisfying revelation.

Men have imposter syndrome, too.

“Who knew!” she said.

She also learned something less funny: leadership can be lonely.

A CEO answers to a board, leads a staff and occupies a strange space between the two where some things can't easily be shared with either.

“There is a lonely zone in there,” she said, “but it doesn't have to be so lonely.”

“We aren't huggers.”

I joined MSMS during Julie's tenure as CEO.

At the end of the interview process, I informed her that I was a hugger.

She informed me: “We aren't huggers.”

That didn't hold.

Julie and I became extraordinarily close. Our one-on-ones might last 15 minutes or more than an hour. We talked strategy, finances, people, politics and whatever crisis had emerged that day.

She also occasionally provided important developmental feedback.

“Not every thought in here,” she'd say, pointing to her head, “needs to come out of here,” pointing to her mouth.

I've remembered that advice from that moment on.

Following it remains a work in progress.

What I didn't fully understand until asking her these questions was how she experienced our relationship.

“You were probably the single best decision I made in terms of elevating the culture of the organization,” she told me.

Then she said something that hit much harder.

“It was one of the easiest, most fun working relationships I've ever had, and it made being CEO livable even in the worst moments.”

Eventually we stopped being CEO and COO and simply became Julie and Kevin.

She hugs me now, by the way.

I consider this one of my greatest professional accomplishments.

What stays

When I asked Julie who had shaped her life, she talked about two grandmothers who have been gone for more than 15 years.

They lived very different lives at a time when women had far fewer choices. Both, she said, were fierce in their own ways. And she never doubted that they loved and supported her.

She still imagines them cheering her on.

Maybe that's another kind of thread.

The people who shape us don't necessarily disappear when the job ends, the geography changes or even when they're gone.

Julie knows something about that.

She told me there are four people from her career whose lives and trajectories she will always care about—and whom she'd build something with again “in a heartbeat.”

I'm lucky enough to be one of them.

Still following

Julie has more freedom these days, but absolutely no intention of becoming less curious.

“My idea of hell is a 55+ community of people just like me,” she said. “No thank you.”

Instead, she's deliberately staying connected to people in different stages of life and exploring creative things she never had time for while working.

She's learning how to build a YouTube channel. She's developing a podcast. She's accumulating footage, ideas and another occasional round of imposter syndrome.

And then she keeps going.

“It doesn't matter what anyone else thinks if I'm enjoying the process of learning and creating,” she said. “This is my time of life to choose, and I have no fear of being bored.”

More than three decades after walking into MSMS looking for whatever came next, Julie Novak is still doing exactly what she did then.

Staying curious.

Learning.

Connecting.

And following the next thread.