Jeff Hunnicutt, Navista COO and Former Highlands Oncology Group CEO Joins Practice at the Speed of Innovation™ to Explore What It Takes to Build an AI-Ready Oncology Practice

Episode 2 examines the infrastructure, data, organizational discipline and culture community oncology practices need to move AI from promise to practice.

ORLANDO, Fla., Aug. 19, 2026 /PRNewswire/ -- Practice at the Speed of Innovation™, the podcast and video series presented by Oncologic.ai, today announced the release of its second episode, "What a Software Developer Learned Running a Cancer Center," featuring Jeff Hunnicutt, COO of Navista and former CEO of Highlands Oncology Group.

Recorded at the 2026 Community Oncology Alliance (COA) Conference in Orlando, Florida, Episode 2 follows the series' inaugural conversation about how oncology practices can begin evaluating AI with the critical next question: What does a practice need to have in place to successfully implement and scale it?

With a background in software development and years leading Highlands Oncology Group, Hunnicutt brings a unique perspective on the intersection of technology, operations and community cancer care.

In conversation with hosts Dr. Doug Flora, Dr. Sanjay Juneja and Oncologic.ai CEO Clynt Taylor, Hunnicutt explores why AI readiness starts long before selecting a technology with connected and normalized data, organizational readiness for change, the right stakeholders at the table, and the ability to continuously measure and improve what is implemented.

"AI is not a product that you install," Flora says during the conversation. "It is an unglamorous, heavy lift to make sure you're organized, that you have infrastructure, that you understand your own data governance, that you have the right people at the table."

Hunnicutt shares how Highlands built that foundation and why practices don't need to transform everything at once. "Identify a single use case inside the practice that you know that you can crush," Hunnicutt says. "Find the one thing that can make a tremendous impact in your practice."

The episode examines how early wins can build physician and staff confidence, why practices should consider platforms and partners capable of expanding beyond a single point solution, and how AI implementation requires ongoing iteration. Hunnicutt illustrates this with Highlands' deployment of agentic AI in patient call workflows, which improved from approximately 85 percent success at launch to more than 90 percent within weeks through close collaboration and continuous evaluation.

The episode concludes with a practical challenge for oncology leaders: Pick the three most important clinical or operational questions your practice should be able to answer with its own data and find out if you can actually answer them today. If not, the missing data foundation may be the right first project.

The Conversation Continues

Episode 2 is part of a series of conversations recorded at the 2026 COA Conference and ASCO Annual Meeting with nationally recognized leaders shaping the future of community cancer care.

Upcoming episodes will feature Dr. Lucio Gordan, President of Florida Cancer Specialists & Research Institute; Dr. Sibel Blau, President & CEO of ONCare Alliance; Dr. Debra Patt, President of the Community Oncology Alliance; Dr. Stephen "Fred" Divers, Chief Medical Officer of American Oncology Network; Dr. Gurjyot "Gury" Doshi, Medical Director at Texas Oncology; Dr. David Waterhouse, Chief Innovation Officer at Oncology Hematology Care; Dr. Bradley Somer, President of West Cancer Center & Research Institute; and Dr. Manoj Bupathi, President of Rocky Mountain Cancer Centers.

Together, the conversations explore the practical decisions oncology leaders must make now from organizational readiness and data infrastructure to workflow automation, precision medicine, clinical trials, operational efficiency and accelerating time-to-therapy.

"Our goal with this series is to move from talking about the potential of AI to sharing how the leaders doing this work are actually putting it into practice," said Clynt Taylor, CEO of Oncologic.ai and co-host of the series. "Jeff's experience is a perfect example. The technology matters, but the infrastructure, discipline and organizational readiness behind it are what allow innovation to scale."

Practice at the Speed of Innovation™ is available across major podcast platforms, YouTube, LinkedIn and Oncologic.ai.

About Practice at the Speed of Innovation™

Practice at the Speed of Innovation™ is the podcast and video series from Oncologic.ai featuring the physicians, practice leaders and innovators shaping the AI-enabled future of community oncology. Through candid conversations and practical insights, the series explores how responsible AI adoption can help community oncology continue leading the delivery of precision cancer care for more than 80% of America's cancer patients bringing the latest advances closer to home, at scale.

About Oncologic.ai

Oncologic.ai is the category-defining Oncology Process Orchestration Platform™, purpose-built for community oncology, unifying agentic AI for diagnostics, therapy selection, prior authorization and workflow automation. Oncologic.ai helps practices reduce administrative burden, keep pace with rapidly evolving cancer science and accelerate time-to-therapy.

SOURCE Oncologic.ai