Baystate Health, whose chief executive recently wrote a book about how to fire employees with “clarity, confidence, compassion,” has been getting more practice at the skill, according to the nurses’ union at the hospital system.
Baystate, which is Western Massachusetts’ largest health care system and is headed by chief executive Peter D. Banko, laid off an unspecified number of employees this week at Baystate Franklin Medical Center, said the Massachusetts Nurses Association. Baystate Franklin is one of several acute care hospitals in the health system.
The layoffs affected employees across 22 departments, said the union. They included employees who transport patients, take care of facilities, and work in information technology, according to Joe Markman, a spokesperson for the union. He was not aware of any nurses who lost their jobs.
A spokesperson for Baystate did not return multiple phone calls or an email.
“We are heartbroken for our colleagues who lost their jobs,” said Suzanne Love, a registered nurse and cochair of the MNA bargaining committee. “Many of these staff members have dedicated years, and in some cases decades, of service to our patients and community.”
The layoffs come as Baystate Franklin nurses continue negotiations for a new contract focused on recruitment and retention, safe staffing, affordable health insurance, and preserving access to high-quality local care, according to the MNA. Ninety-eight percent of Baystate Franklin nurses voted to reject Baystate’s final contract offer on June 10.
Markman said management also eliminated nursing positions in the emergency department at Baystate Noble Hospital in Westfield.
Last month, Forbes Books published a book Banko wrote called “The Necessary Goodbye: How Great Leaders Fire with Clarity, Confidence, and Compassion.”
Since he arrived at the Pioneer Valley health system in June 2024 after heading Centura Health in Centennial, Colo., Banko has accumulated considerable experience terminating employees. Baystate has shed at least 395 jobs since then in what Banko has described as an effort to stabilize the system’s finances.
In September 2024, Baystate announced that three senior vice presidents would be leaving the organization in a shake-up. Two months later, Banko said Baystate was eliminating 134 more management jobs, including vacant positions. In February 2025, the health system cut 98 corporate positions. Two months later, Baystate said it was laying off 43 employees.
In February of this year, Baystate confirmed that it had reduced its workforce by another 117 corporate positions, citing a variety of financial challenges, including the expiration of enhanced subsidies under the Affordable Care Act and cuts in Medicaid funding.
“I am truly sorry that we continue to have to make these reductions in force,” Banko said in an email to employees in February, adding: “They are not popular. Nor are they the fun part of the job.”
Like other hospital systems in the state, Baystate has faced serious financial challenges in recent years. It reported losing $61 million in 2024, $63 million in 2023, and $177 million in 2022.
It is now performing better financially. In the 12 months that ended in September, Baystate reported its first operating gain in four years, with a $16.8 million operating margin on $3.35 billion in revenue.
In April, Baystate announced that it plans to acquire struggling Mercy Medical Center, merging the ownership of two Springfield hospitals.
The deal, which requires review by state officials, would further consolidation among the state’s providers at a time when many hospitals are financially strained. It would bring Mercy’s 182-bed hospital, its joint venture affiliates, and medical groups into Baystate, which has its flagship hospital and is headquartered in Springfield.
Banko has stirred controversy at Baystate, partly because of his penchant for writing.
In May of last year, the Globe reported that more than 20 posts in his weekly blog for Baystate employees contained passages that were identical or nearly identical to those in articles that appeared elsewhere including in Forbes and NPR.
Banko’s posts became the subject of an anonymous complaint to Baystate’s compliance department by an employee who accused the chief executive of plagiarism and said it violated the hospital’s code of conduct.
A day after the story ran, Banko emailed employees a lengthy apology for repeatedly using passages from other writers’ work.
Jonathan Saltzman can be reached at jonathan.saltzman@globe.com.