(Bloomberg) -- CVS Health Corp.’s new Chief Executive Officer David Joyner issued a plea for help to workers as he sets upon fixing the troubled health conglomerate he took over from ousted CEO Karen Lynch.
“Here’s where I need your help,” Joyner said in an internal memo sent to staff on Friday seen by Bloomberg News. “It is no secret that our industry faces significant and dynamic challenges, and that CVS Health must make financial and operational improvements to drive elite execution and maintain our position as a leading health care company,” he said.
He takes over the company following months of upheaval, including missed earnings targets, activist interest, and shareholder unrest that spilled into public view in recent weeks.
CVS had been reviewing its strategic options for months, including a potential breakup, Bloomberg News has reported, as rising medical costs in its Aetna insurance arm weighed on the business. The company said on Friday that it would not pursue a breakup.
Joyner, 60, is a longtime executive who most recently oversaw the company’s pharmacy benefits business. He had come out of retirement to rejoin CVS after exploring “remote parts of this country with my wife, dog, and RV,” he said in the letter to workers. He said he received a call from Lynch in 2022 asking him to return and didn’t hesitate to answer: “I felt that I had more I could give the company and wanted to do my part to help.”
In the memo, Joyner said that in order for the company to be successful, it needed to “operate as one CVS Health.”
“A single team that does many things every day to help more than 100 million Americans achieve greater access, better affordability, and superior care,” he said.
--With assistance from John Tozzi.
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