It's a pleasure to work in nonprofit health care. It feeds my soul. It's about partnering with our communities, investing in people and providing high-quality services to our members and patients when they are most vulnerable.

I'm passionate about helping find solutions to each person's unique needs – affordable and accessible health care, benefits and support and increasing awareness of social determinants that often create obstacles for many.

As Senior Vice President of Human Resources (HR) and Chief People Officer at HealthPartners, it also energizes me to partner with and empower more than 26,000 colleagues daily as they deliver high-quality care and coverage.

I'm responsible for HR initiatives to help recruit and retain our talented colleagues. That includes engaging them in our Head +Heart Together culture, building a diverse workforce, creating an inclusive work environment, increasing health equity and ensuring everyone feels welcomed, included and valued. It's a journey!

Ultimately, this helps foster a teamwork-focused environment where relationships, continuous communication and shared values across departments strengthen progress toward our goals.

Having worked in HR leadership roles for nearly 30 years, I've learned that it takes open and honest dialogue to achieve excellence, have healthy-high performing teams and ensure our people and processes thrive.

That philosophy has helped HealthPartners become a Star Tribune Top 100 Workplace and win national recognition for its health plan and care system. When I led the HR department at Kaiser Permanente Mid-Atlantic, they also won top workplace honors, including being nationally recognized by the National Committee for Quality Assurance (NCQA) for multicultural health care excellence.

Together, we can drive visibility to people-centric changes that make everyone feel like they belong.

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