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Houston hospitals once again dominate annual national rankings

No other city in Texas comes close to grabbing so many top national rankings. Photo by Dwight C. Andrews/Greater Houston Convention and Visitors Bureau

It stands to reason that as home to the Texas Medical Center, the world's largest medical complex, Houston would be blessed with outstanding hospitals. New national rankings from U.S. News & World Report show just how true that is.

The rankings put Houston Methodist Hospital at No. 16 among the best hospitals in the country, and at No. 10 for gastroenterology and GI surgery. Meanwhile, Houston's University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center tops the list of the best hospitals for cancer care, and claims the No. 4 spot for urology and No. 5 spot for gynecology.

Elsewhere in Houston, TIRR Memorial Hermann Hospital appears at No. 2 for rehabilitation, Texas Children's Hospital lands at No. 3 among the best children's hospitals, and the Menninger Clinic ranks eighth for psychiatry.

No other city in Texas comes close to grabbing so many top national rankings from U.S. News & World Report.

Houston Methodist Hospital climbed four spots in this year's overall ranking, up from No. 20 last year.

"This is a tremendous achievement for our physicians and employees who dedicate themselves every day to our patients — especially now as we celebrate this news during another surge in the pandemic," Dr. Marc Boom, president and CEO of Houston Methodist, says in a news release.

"These national accolades are something to be proud of, but most important, our patients are benefiting from all of our hard work," Boom adds. "Ultimately, they are the reason we need to be one of the best hospital systems in the country."

MD Anderson once again leads the way in the cancer category, while also earning high marks for urology and gynecology.

"This year's ranking is especially rewarding considering the exceptional teamwork and collaboration we have seen throughout our institution during an unprecedented pandemic that created heightened risks for immunocompromised cancer patients," Dr. Peter WT Pisters, president of MD Anderson, says in a news release.

"No matter the challenge, we are here for our patients, for each other, and for our community. We thank everyone for their unwavering support that has helped us earn the top ranking in cancer in the midst of a pandemic," Pisters adds.

TIRR Memorial Hermann climbed in the rehab ranking from No. 3 last year to No. 2 this year.

"The methodology for the rankings have evolved to include more aspects of quality in addition to reputation, which is extremely meaningful to our employees and affiliated physicians," Rhonda Abbott, senior vice president and CEO of TIRR Memorial Hermann, says in a news release.

"With our ranking improving this year, it confirms our focus on patient outcomes and the quality of care that we strive for with all of our patients in need of rehabilitation," Abbott adds. "While the rankings sometimes fluctuate from year to year, they tell the story that we at TIRR Memorial Hermann are leaders in rehabilitation through our focus on research, education, clinical care, and advocacy."

Texas Children's Hospital scored a third-place ranking nationally among children's hospitals, matching its showing on last year's list. This is the 13th consecutive year that it's been recognized among the best children's hospitals in the country by U.S. News & World Report.

"Our best is something we strive for each day, caring for our patients — not looking back at what we accomplished but towards what we can do tomorrow," Texas Children's Hospital says on its website.

Also in this year's top 10 for specialty hospitals is the Menninger Clinic, which jumped from No. 9 last year to No. 8 this year. The facility has secured a place in U.S. News & World Report's top 10 for psychiatry since the inception of the rankings.

"Our specialty is precision mental health and substance use care," Armando Colombo, president and CEO of Menninger, says in a news release. "Patients seeking care from [us] are looking for the best diagnostics and effective evidence-based treatment that's right for their goals and symptoms."

"We have a wide range of specialists who provide new solutions as well as proven, cutting-edge treatments for a positive outcome that the patient can sustain to enjoy improved overall health and a better life," Colombo adds.

Texas Heart Institute at Baylor St. Luke's Medical Center ranked 13th in the nation among Adult Cardiology & Heart Surgery hospitals.

"We are the highest-ranking heart and cardiac surgery center in Houston, Texas, and we are proud to be back on top," says Texas Heart Institute's assistant medical director, Dr. Stephanie Coulter, in a release.

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Building Houston

 
 

Gaurab Chakrabarti, the CEO and co-founder of Solugen, shared his entrepreneurial journey on the SXSW stage this year. Photo courtesy of the Greater Houston Partnership

At a fireside chat at SXSW, a Houston founder pulled back the curtain on his entrepreneurial journey that's taken him from an idea of how to make the chemicals industry more sustainable to a company valued at over $2 billion.

Gaurab Chakrabarti, the CEO and co-founder of Solugen, joined the Greater Houston Partnership's Houston House at SXSW on Monday, March 13, for a discussion entitled, "Building a Tech Unicorn." In the conversation with Payal Patel, principal of Softeq Ventures, he share the trials and tribulations from the early days of founding Solugen. The company, which has raised over $600 million since its founding in 2016, has an innovative and carbon negative process of creating plant-derived substitutes for petroleum-based products.

The event, which quickly reached capacity with eager SXSW attendees, allowed Chakrabarti to instill advice on several topics — from early customer acquisition and navigating VC investing to finding the right city to grow in and setting up a strong company culture.

Here are seven pieces of startup advice from Chakrabarti's talk.

1. Don’t be near a black hole.

Chakrabarti began his discussion addressing the good luck he's had standing up Solugen. He's the first to admit that luck is an important element to his success, but he says, as a founder, you can set yourself up for luck in a handful of ways.

“You do make your own luck, but you have to be putting in the work to do it," Chakrabarti says, adding that it's not an easy thing to accomplish. “There are things you can be doing to increase your luck surface area."

One of the principals he notes on is not surrounding yourself with black holes. These are people who don't believe in your idea, or your ability to succeed, Chakrabarti explains, referencing a former dean who said he was wasting his talent on his idea for Solugen.

2. The co-founder dynamic is the most important thing.

Early on, Chakrabarti emphasizes how important having a strong co-founder relationship is, crediting Solugen's co-founder and CTO Sean Hunt for being his "intellectual ping-pong partner."

“If you have a co-founder, that is the thing that’s going to make or break your company,” he says. “It’s not your idea, and it’s not your execution — it’s your relationship with your co-founder.”

Hunt and Chakrabarti have been friends for 12 years, Chakrabarti says, and, that foundation and the fact that they've been passionate about their product since day one, has been integral for Solugen's success.

"We had a conviction that we were building something that could be impactful to the rest of the world," he says.

3. Confirm a market of customers early on.

Chakrabarti says that in the early days of starting his company, he didn't have a concept of startup accelerators or other ways to access funding — he just knew he had to get customers to create revenue as soon as possible.

He learned about the growing float spa industry, and how a huge cost for these businesses was peroxide that was used to sanitize the water in the floating pods. Chakrabarti and Hunt had created a small amount of what they were calling bioperoxide that they could sell at a cheaper cost to these spas and still pocket a profit.

“We ended up owning 80 percent of the float spa market,” Chakrabarti says. “That taught us that, ‘wow, there’s something here.”

While it was unglamourous work to call down Texas float spas, his efforts secured Solugen's first 100 or so customers and identified a path to profitability early on.

“Find your niche market that allows you to justify that your technology or product that has a customer basis,” Chakrabarti says on the lesson he learned through this process.

4. Find city-company fit.

While Chakrabarti has lived in Houston most of his life, the reason Solugen is headquartered in Houston is not due to loyalty of his hometown.

In fact, Chakrabarti shared a story of how a potential seed investor asked Chakrabarti and Hunt to move their company to the Bay Area, and the co-founders refused the offer and the investment.

“There’s no way our business could succeed in the Bay Area," Chakrabarti says. He and Hunt firmly believed this at the time — and still do.

“For our business, if you look at the density of chemical engineers, the density of our potential customers, and the density of people who know how to do enzyme engineering, Houston happened to be that perfect trifecta for us," he explains.

He argues that every company — software, hardware, etc. — has an opportunity to find their ideal city-company fit, something that's important to its success.

5. Prove your ability to execute.

When asked about pivots, Chakrabarti told a little-known story of how Solugen started a commercial cleaning brand. The product line was called Ode to Clean, and it was marketed as eco-friendly peroxide wipes. At the time, Solugen was just three employees, and the scrappy team was fulfilling orders and figuring out consumer marketing for the first time.

He says his network was laughing at the idea of Chakrabarti creating this direct-to-consumer cleaning product, and it was funny to him too, but the sales told another story.

At launch, they sold out $1 million of inventory in one week. But that wasn't it.

“Within three months, we got three acquisition offers," Chakrabarti says.

The move led to a brand acquisition of the product line, with the acquirer being the nation's largest cleaning wipe provider. It meant three years of predictable revenue that de-risked the business for new investors — which were now knocking on Solugen's door with their own investment term sheets.

“It told the market more about us as a company,” he says. “It taught the market that Solugen is a company that is going to survive no matter what. … And we’re a team that can execute.”

What started as a silly idea led to Solugen being one step closer to accomplishing its long-term goals.

“That pivot was one of the most important pivots in the company’s history that accelerated our company’s trajectory by four or five years," Chakrabarti says.

6. Adopt and maintain a miso-management style.

There's one lesson Chakrabarti says he learned the hard way, and that was how to manage his company's growing team. He shares that he "let go of the reins a bit" at the company's $400-$500 million point. He says that, while there's this idea that successful business leaders can hire the best talent that allows them to step back from the day-to-day responsibilities, that was not the right move for him.

“Only founders really understand the pain points of the business," Chakrabarti says. "Because it’s emotionally tied to you, you actually feel it."

Rather than a micro or macro-management style, Chakrabarti's describes his leadership as meso-management — something in between.

The only difference, Chakrabarti says, is how he manages his board. For that group, he micromanages to ensure that they are doing what's best for his vision for Solugen.

7. Your culture should be polarizing.

Chakrabarti wrapped up his story on talking about hiring and setting up a company culture for Solugen. The company's atmosphere is not for everyone, he explains.

“If you’re not polarizing some people, it’s not a culture,” Chakrabarti says, encouraging founders to create a culture that's not one size fits all.

He says he was attracted to early employees who got mad at the same things he did — that passion is what makes his team different from others.

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