How did you become an executive in the healthcare industry? Did you always have an interest in healthcare?

Health care has always been a part of my life. My father is a physician and we frequently talked about health care and listened to stories about his patients at the dinner table. My parents instilled in me early on that we have an obligation to help others and to help our world to be better for everyone. Candidly, after watching his lifestyle and the constant demand from patients at all hours of the day and night, which often took him away from our family, I decided against pursuing a medical degree. However, I was always interested in the business aspects of health care and finding ways to make the system better for patients.

My personal health care journey started after college when I served for 2.5 years as a Maternal Child Health Peace Corps volunteer. Through this experience, I witnessed firsthand how a lack of access to quality maternal health care paired with low health literacy can negatively impact women and families. This experience left me with a lasting desire to change existing delivery systems to care for vulnerable populations. When I returned to the states, I completed a MPH to learn more about how best to create and build systematic change in health care.

I’ve now spent nearly 30 years working in health care, and have always chosen roles that focus on transforming the care delivery system for better patient outcomes. I’ve worked at companies ranging from startups to publicly traded companies — in the purchaser, payor and provider sides of the business — and my passion for implementing institutional change and innovation in this dynamic industry remains as steadfast as ever! 

You joined Maven Clinic as Chief Commercial Officer this fall – congratulations! How did you deal with the many challenges that come with starting a new position during the pandemic?

Thank you! I am so thrilled to be part of the amazing Maven team. The opportunity to get back to my roots — and change the health of the world, one woman, one family at a time — through our amazing fertility, maternity, and parenting offerings was a chance I could not pass up. 

The best part about Maven is our culture. There is a strong ethos built around our mission to help and support each other through challenging times. Maven has nearly doubled in size during the pandemic but we’ve still been able to foster the culture that makes us so unique and build and maintain community virtually. We host twice weekly team meetings as well as fun activities like a company-wide talent show, cooking classes, 1:1 coffee meetings via Donut, costume contests, and more.

I will admit that onboarding virtually is hard but these opportunities to come together as a team has certainly made it easier. I am a people person and building trust and respect with my team and throughout the organization is much harder via Zoom. Ultimately, to be a great leader, you have to be a great listener. You learn how to “read the room” very differently on a video call – it can be done!

You serve on a number of community and nonprofit boards. How has board service brought you closer to your community?

One of my core values — and one that I speak with my teenage girls about often — is the importance of service to your communities. Giving back and supporting the lives closest to you is incredibly important for creating thriving, sustainable, communities and can also be hugely personally fulfilling.

The Healthsource RI board, RI’s public exchange, has been a great way to apply my health insurance and customer acquisition experience to help the team successfully ensure that all RI’ers have access to affordable health insurance coverage. With Social Enterprise Greenhouse, I get the chance to help local entrepreneurs refine their business models and make an impact on our local community. We have helped ~650 ventures and improved 5M lives.

When people from diverse backgrounds come together for a common goal, great things happen. Through my board experiences, I have been fortunate to learn more about all segments of the economy and work with people from a range of backgrounds who are united by a shared mission.

As a passionate mentor of fellow women leaders, how has the advice you give mentees changed over the past year? What leadership qualities will you be championing in 2021?

2020 was an incredibly challenging year for everyone, and has hit women particularly hard. Nearly 5M women left the US workforce in 2020, setting back decades of progress on gender diversity. Juggling work and family has never been easy but COVID eliminated all the traditional support systems – family, friends, day care and schools. After all this time, we have not invested in systemic changes to support new and young families. We need to do better. In the meantime, mentorship and 1:1 support has felt even more critical.

For 2021, the key leadership quality that I champion now is resilience. When you have so much uncertainty — how the markets will perform, how customers will buy, how your team is balancing intense personal issues, you have to be flexible and be willing to be ok with a lot of gray. Self-care is a key part of resilience. You can’t lead your teams when you are overwhelmed and exhausted. We all have to find ways to create and maintain energy for those around us — it might be new books, or a new sport, or new healthy recipes or just taking the time you need to get real rest. I love the Martin Luther King Jr. quote, “Faith is taking the first step even when you don’t see the whole staircase.”

There is no playbook for the world we are in. We are all going to continue to make mistakes but remaining positive and focused and not afraid of new and difficult paths will help everyone get through the next 12 months and come out even stronger.

What is your professional New Year’s resolution, and how will you achieve it?

There is so much that I am excited to accomplish professionally this year with our awesome team at Maven. One area I’m focusing on, and am encouraging my team to focus on, is continuing to expand our professional networks, gain market knowledge and not be incredibly internally-oriented – which is challenging in an all-virtual environment. I am making a dedicated effort to spend time listening and learning from others. We have to continue to network, both for professional and personal reasons, and it takes a concerted effort to do so virtually. That is why organizations like WBL are so important. We appreciate you fostering connections among this amazing group of people!

Personally or professionally, what might the WBL network be surprised to know about you?

I turn 50 this year and I am committed to entering the next decade physically strong. My personal motto is “Life Begins at the End of your Comfort Zone.” This year I am taking up boxing. It is incredibly fun, and very challenging. I am an avid yogi and generally tend towards more endurance sports – running, biking, etc. I am not naturally physically aggressive so learning how to punch accurately while constantly moving is super hard! My personal motto is that life begins at the end of your comfort zone. I am definitely out of my comfort zone when boxing!