One leading angel at a time: that’s how Nathalie Arteel supports leaders through the Thinking into Results program. This month, Nathalie introduces you to Patrice Buyck, General Director of AZ Zeno in Knokke-Heist. She is a leading angel — radiating light, inspiring others, and motivating everyone around her.
“Credit where credit is due,” begins Patrice Buyck, General Director of AZ Zeno in Knokke-Heist. “My predecessor dared to build a hospital that’s different. It was inspired by René Magritte: Ceci n’est pas un hôpital — this is not a hospital. They even had to put the name on the building, otherwise people had no idea what it was,” she laughs.
The building that houses AZ Zeno is indeed an architectural masterpiece. To preserve the panoramic view of the surrounding polder landscape, it was built on stilts. From a distance, it looks like a floating cloud; as you get closer, it resembles a rising spaceship.
A Green, Healing Environment
I visit Patrice to talk about her leadership style and the organizational culture of Knokke’s largest employer. “The building is beautiful — and so are the people inside it,” Patrice says. She refers not only to the staff but also to the patients:
“We call a patient ‘a person with an illness,’ not ‘a sick person.’ That’s a fundamental difference, because someone with an illness is first and foremost a person.”
“We offer patients a green, healing environment that positively influences their recovery process. We follow Machteld Huber’s Positive Health model and ask patients what makes them feel better. It’s scientifically proven that people heal faster and have higher survival rates when they feel good. Our 17-hectare site offers plenty of connection with nature — there’s a food forest and vegetable gardens. All meals in our hospital are prepared with vegetables grown on our own land. Volunteers and psychiatric patients help cultivate the fields, either as relaxation or as part of their therapy. We consider healthy food as therapy too. Last year, our hospital kitchen received a Gault&Millau Award for Future Wellbeing, a wonderful recognition of our efforts.”
“If you treat patients like children, they’ll behave like children,” Patrice continues. “The same goes for employees. That’s why a control culture doesn’t work. As a leader, you must truly love the people who work for you. Your most important task is to make them feel safe — by empowering them, developing their talents, and recognizing them positively. That’s how you create positive energy and build an organization people genuinely want to work for. That energy may be invisible, but I advocate cultivating the invisible. For example, we don’t do performance reviews — we have appreciation talks instead. We want to leave a positive mark on our employees at every possible moment. Many people have been coming here with great enthusiasm for over 30 years because they feel they make a difference.”
A Meeting That Left a Lasting Impression
Since 2021, Patrice Buyck has been the CEO of AZ Zeno. She was drawn to the hospital because its values — warmth, hospitality, connection, competence and innovation — resonate deeply with her. Trained as a computer scientist, Patrice began her career at Colruyt, where she helped develop the pioneering punch-card system that allowed products to be priced and scanned at the checkout via computer. Through her son, who has a disability, she discovered the world of healthcare. She first became IT Director and later General Director at UMC Sint-Pieter in Brussels. It was there that she met someone who would change her entire approach to leadership.
“One day after surgery, Frederic Laloux, the author of Reinventing Organizations, stood at my desk,” Patrice recalls. “He wanted to spar with me about new ways of running a hospital — ways that didn’t rely on centralized decision-making. As a leader, you’re trained to see problems and solve them.
Frederic helped me look at the workplace differently: how do you truly engage people, and how do you create a dynamic, creative environment built on positivity, appreciation, and trust? Instead of focusing on your own agenda and trying to achieve the best results with the least effort, you should focus on the talents of your employees. That’s why I keep an open door and always make time for people — that’s incredibly important.”
Standing in Your Own Power
After many years of coaching, Patrice discovered that true leadership begins with herself.
“Otherwise, you let yourself be guided by fear and external factors. But what can you change most easily? Yourself! So dare to invest in yourself if you want to be an example for others. The Thinking into Results program by Nathalie Arteel has changed how I think and who I am. I learned techniques to be a leader who radiates calm, authenticity, and connection.”
“There’s a big difference between knowing and doing. In the past, I had tools and books on my shelf, but they didn’t change me. Through Thinking into Results, I learned to actually put principles into practice. By repetition, you turn learning into habits and make it part of your subconscious. From that point on, your way of thinking and acting — your very being — starts to change. Nathalie, our journey together has truly made me a different leader — and a different person.”
Being Yourself as a CEO
“The hardest part of leadership is making decisions that don’t please everyone. But when they come from your inner strength, and you’re convinced it’s the right thing to do, you’re no longer dependent on what others think of you. I’m not afraid anymore — though that doesn’t mean I never lose sleep. Being a CEO isn’t a job; it’s not from eight to five and then over. It’s part of who you are. What would I tell other leaders? Let go and be yourself. Be authentic. Lead from your inner strength, not from the outside world. Don’t get overwhelmed by the noise and constant messages. Stay close to the people in your organization. When people truly feel the ‘why’ behind what they do, that’s when your organization has a real DNA.”
📺 Watch the full interview
