Hard work, no ‘stodgy CEO’

FAMILIARITY BREEDS INNOVATION: Since founding Chartwise Medical Systems in 2009, Dr. Jonathan Elion, center, has relied on many people who worked with him in his previous successful startup, Heartlab. With him at Chartwise's South Kingstown offices are, from left, Martin Bradburn, test engineer, Brendan Laws, software architect, Linda Markhart, test manager, and Mary Cooper, executive vice president.
FAMILIARITY BREEDS INNOVATION: Since founding Chartwise Medical Systems in 2009, Dr. Jonathan Elion, center, has relied on many people who worked with him in his previous successful startup, Heartlab. With him at Chartwise's South Kingstown offices are, from left, Martin Bradburn, test engineer, Brendan Laws, software architect, Linda Markhart, test manager, and Mary Cooper, executive vice president.

CEO (or equivalent): Dr. Jonathan Elion

2015 Revenue: $4,045,716

2013 Revenue: $850,852

Revenue growth: 375%

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No one could ever accuse ChartWise Medical Systems Inc. of being conventional. From its products and services to its people and workplace culture, it’s anything but.

This, according to founder and CEO Dr. Jonathan Elion, is one of the company’s keys to success.

“It’s supposed to be fun; nobody said work had to be drudgery,” he said.

Indicating the laid-back – but no less dedicated or hard-working – atmosphere that permeates the company’s South Kingstown headquarters, Elion added with a laugh: “Even the CEO is subject to being bombarded by Nerf darts.”

Elion, a practicing, board-certified cardiologist, founded the company in 2009 after selling his previous successful venture, Heartlab Inc., which designed and supplied digital-image and information networks specific to cardiology to Agfa HealthCare.

The company’s flagship product is its ChartWise clinical documentation improvement software, now in its second iteration (2.0 was released in 2014). The system is designed to address and improve documentation challenges in hospitals, with a goal to help mitigate risk and maximize reimbursement, Elion explained. Most importantly to ChartWise, the hope is that the product will also have a profound effect on quality of care.

“There’s just nothing else like it on the market,” he said. “Anytime I am allowed to compete head to head, people’s jaws drop. It’s a huge step forward over current methodologies.”

As a result of ChartWise’s innovation, it has experienced significant and steady gains in just a short period of time.

The company grew its revenue 75 percent in 2015, and is on track for another jump of 50-60 percent in 2016. As Elion noted, “we’ve had very gratifying growth, and 2017 is looking very rosy as well.”

As a means to further improve the use, understanding and proficiency of the software, the company also recently launched ChartWise Advisory Services.

Ultimately, the company, although small, “is seen as a thought leader in the field,” Elion said. That’s one of the advantages of being a young company, he emphasized: Being able to move quickly, and being able to create innovation (as opposed to buying it, as is often the practice of multibillion-dollar companies).

Another of ChartWise’s advantages is its team. Many of the company’s roughly two-dozen employees came over from Heartlab, and as Elion quipped, “we like to say that we’re getting the band back together.”

Since many of them have worked together for years, they’ve developed a symbiotic working relationship based on trust that incorporates “very open, honest, frank discussions.

“It’s nice to have passionate discussions,” he said.

He also lauded the group’s state education; his employees are graduates of Brown University, Johnson & Wales University, the University of Rhode Island and Community College of Rhode Island, among others.

“It’s a wonderful, rich pool,” he said. “As a state, we need to be prouder of our education system. There’s a terrific wealth of technical knowledge here.”

Then there’s Elion himself. He’s known for playing his guitar when doing keynotes – a practice that he started at a national convention in Nashville; he thought it only fitting in that musical city – and also made news when he won a competition to sing onstage with Jimmy Buffett.

“People find it refreshing that it’s not this stodgy CEO in a three-piece suit,” he said. “It’s all just about having fun.” •

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