Leaving a Legacy
A quote made popular by filmmaker and actor Woody Allen states, “If you want to make God laugh, tell Him about your plans.”
Bryan Mills, who recently retired from Community Health Network as president and CEO, once thought he would work as an accountant for a small business.
A lifetime of mentors disagreed with him, seeing potential far beyond his expectations.
Mills, who served with Community Health for 40 years, spent his teen years baling hay for his friends’ fathers in the summer. One of them, Jack Chapman, told him, “Bryan, you better go to work, you better go to college, you ain’t no farmer,” recalls Mills with a laugh. Chapman was joking, but a steady stream of motivators guided Mills to where he is today, including his driver’s education teacher at Noblesville High School, Jim Belden, who recruited Mills to play football. Belden refused to take “no” for an answer.
“He saw something in me that I didn’t see myself, and so therefore I played ball and had two good years with him,” Mills says. He also played basketball and later coached the sport to youth.
While studying accounting at Ball State University, Mills searched for an internship with a small firm. On the day he waited for his three interviews in the college’s career services department, a hiring manager announced to those waiting that someone did not show for an interview, leaving an open spot.
“I didn’t know who he was or even what it was about, but I thought, ‘OK, what the heck,’ so I sat down and talked to this guy, and he was a managing partner at what’s now Ernst & Young,” Mills says.
Mills accepted an offer to work with the company, where he was eventually employed full time until his manager accepted a job as CFO for Community Health Network. In 1984, there was only one hospital in the network, Community Hospital East. Mills’ manager invited him to be part of the leadership team to open what is now Community Hospital North in Castleton one year later, managing the finances. In 1992, Mills served as CEO of Visionary Enterprises Inc. (VEI), a for-profit affiliate of Community Health Network.
In 2009, after Bill Corley announced his retirement as CEO of Community Health Network, the board of directors approached Mills and asked why he had not applied as Corley’s successor. Mills was not interested, explaining that he did not think he was qualified. Members of the board convinced him otherwise. Two weeks into his new role, Mills panicked, overwhelmed and ready to quit, so he called his friend and mentor on the board, John “Jack” Heiney. They met, and Heiney gave Mills a pep talk.
“I’m whining about all the reasons why I don’t know what I’m doing, and Heiney gave me the best advice that I’ve ever received professionally,” Mills recalls. “He looked at me and said, ‘I thought you coached all those kids on basketball teams.’ I said, ‘Yeah, that’s true, what’s that got to do with this conversation?’ He said, ‘Bryan, go coach your team.’ I said, ‘What?’ and he said, ‘Go coach your team.’
“To me, my role has been the chief cultural leader,” Mills continues. “My role was to create the culture of Community and then help us work as a team for the best in terms of patients, and that’s what I’ve been doing the last 20 years. When it’s framed like that, then you think, ‘OK, this is my purpose, and I can do this.’”
Since Mills’ start at Community Health Network, the system has grown to include five acute-care hospitals, with a sixth expected in Westfield by late 2026 or early 2027, a cardiovascular hospital, a recovery center, three rehabilitation hospitals and soon freestanding behavioral health hospitals. Under his leadership, the network expanded to include numerous ambulatory practices, surgery centers, virtual care services and advanced cancer care through a partnership with MD Anderson Cancer Center.
In addition, Forbes has designated Community Health a top employer in Indiana annually since 2022 in “America’s Best-in-State Employers.”
In 2016, Mills created the Alliance for a Healthier Indiana after America’s Health Rankings Report detailed Indiana’s poor outcomes, including the state’s smoking rate, opioid abuse, infant mortality, obesity and public health funding. The Alliance has focused on advocacy and education to substantially reduce tobacco use, the leading cause of preventable death in Indiana.
Mills is eager to step into his next role in retirement.
“My goal is to be a much better granddad and be available for carpooling or seeing events or going to games,” Mills says. He and his wife, Cathie, have four sons and four grandchildren, with a fifth on the way.
Comments 1
My daughter is Beth Tharp. She is now the President of Community Network, all the Community Hospitals in Indiana. I thought you might like to know that she and her husband Dave are now living in Noblesville. They moved here recently, and bought a home on Morris Lake. You might like to interview her. I’m not certain she will do this, but you might try.