Linda Goler Blount, President & CEO of Community Catalyst

This episode of CEOs You Should Know features Linda Goler Blount, President & CEO of Community Catalyst

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Well, I am from a small town in Michigan called Jackson,
and you have to be from Michigan to really know Jackson.
It's not Detroit, but it's about eighty miles west of Detroit.
And spent my wonder years there. Actually went down south
to Clark College in Georgia Tech to do undergrad and
then came back to Michigan to do epidemiology at the

(00:24):
University of Michigan. But I'll tell you I really started
out wanting to go to law school, but my father
and I had a fundamental disagreement about women in the law.
So I ended up doing epidemiology instead, and sort of
did the traditional public health path. I was at the

(00:45):
Centers for Disease Control and then had the opportunity to
actually leave the country. My husband also was at CDC,
and we left the country, and that's where I sort
of got the awareness of difference in health. We were
in a developing country, very poor, but the health of
the people in that country actually was better than the

(01:07):
health of people of color in the US. And so
when I came back, I took a flight detour and
went to work for Coca Cola. But then I got
into the nonprofit space with Cancer Society, with the United Way,
and then as president of the Black Women's Health Imperative,
and I think we have such great opportunity to improve

(01:29):
health here and given what we know about what leads
to poor health outcomes. When I left the Black Women's
Health Imperative and the folks at Community Catalysts said, we
understand the role pricing and discrimination plays and health. We'd
like someone to come help us bring data to that
and policy to that. And Community Catalyst is an amazing

(01:53):
organization and has a long track record of fighting for
those who don't have access to healthcare. So I was
thrilled to be offered this role and I'm so looking
forward to what's next.

Speaker 2 (02:03):
Well outstanding, and I appreciate you setting the table, and
I do want to give a little context to our
listeners because you've been Your resume is fantastic, and the
nonprofit work that you've done is led up to this
new job that's not even two months old as president
of Community Catalysts. As you were going through everything and
deciding to take on this job, and I'm also curious

(02:24):
you know exactly why you did besides maybe just digging
the values in what they were doing out there is
a important time of our history right now doing all
those different kinds of jobs as all these different nonprofits.
What kind of experience did they give you as you
led and consider this new gig.

Speaker 1 (02:42):
Well, you know, it's interesting that I mentioned that I
took a slight detour from public health and went to
Coca Cola. But in the end, I think the coke
job was the best possible thing I could have done
for my public health career because it coke. You know,
we sell things. Yeah, what we do in public health,
I think is we don't realize that we have a

(03:04):
product to sell, and we do a terrible job of
selling it. If you talk to somebody like me, I'm
an epidemiologist, we you know, in about five minutes can
put you to sleep because we have to tell you
everything about the issues. When what people really want to
know is what do I do? Whether where it's at
the Cancer Society, I have cancer, what do I do
Black women's health impaer? Here are these incredible political and

(03:27):
social and economic barriers at health? What do I do? Well?
You know, when I was talking to the to the
board and the team at Community Catalysts, they said, look,
we've got private equity that has moved in and priced
people out of the healthcare market. We know the role
that racism plays in health outcomes. We have to do something.

(03:48):
And that's what attracted me to this role because here
was an organization that was focused on actually doing something,
bringing solutions to like talking to people who are in
positions of power to help them understand that if we
are all healthy, you know, then that means the least
of us or those who those of us who have
been ignored for centuries right need to be healthy as well.

(04:11):
In Community Cantalysts and its team that the people I
have the privilege of working with have the courage to
stand in that space and do what needs to be done.

Speaker 2 (04:20):
Well, that's well said, and you know, you and I
don't have to argue about this one whatsoever. You're coming
in at a very historic time when healthcare seems to
be the news headline all the time right now. So
we'll talk about that, But what I want to do
first is to educate our listeners who haven't heard about
Community Catalyst about mission and vision, which I want to
talk about in just a moment, but also exactly what

(04:42):
you do. And then we'll get into the weeds on
a few things, but if you were to give us
the mission and the vision for Community Catalyst, what is
that thank?

Speaker 1 (04:51):
So? You know, I think in a nutshell. You know,
we're a national nonprofit, so we serve people all over
and we have one simple goal to create a health
system that ensures quality care is accessible, affordable, and accountable
for everyone. And we are Racism and other forms of

(05:12):
discrimination don't determine our health outcomes, so our work matters,
I think more now than ever. We're going to talk
about some of these attacks on our care, but there
are people in this country who, no matter how hard
working they are, simply don't have access to quality care.
And so at Community Cannabis, we're trying to make sure

(05:33):
that there's no barrier to people having what they should have.
And frankly, we believe that healthcare is a right and
we should all be able to enjoy good quality care
and know that when we say evidence based medicine, that
evidence applies to people like us because we were all
included in its creation. Right.

Speaker 2 (05:52):
Well, Linda, you're starting to elude this, but if I
could ask you, if you were to give a thirty
thousand foot view of community catalysts and tell people about
what you do. What would you say that you'd actually do.

Speaker 1 (06:03):
So what I would say is we partner with communities.
We actually invest in communities over the life of the community. Heves.
We've put tens of millions of dollars in community based
organizations because these are people who know what the issues
are of healthcare in their community. So we put both
human and financial resources in communities. We build capacity, We

(06:26):
work with them on programs, on policy to help them
bring solutions to people that are relevant to the people
in their community. So we don't come in and say, well,
we know what to do. We work with community partners.
So you know, for example, you know vaccines were obviously
have been in the news, but are very important. We
saw how important they were. What we worked with communities

(06:49):
to take vaccine education into barbershops, into beauty shops, parking
lots in the Mississippi Delta to make sure that people
had access to vaccines, knew about them, knew how important
they were, and weren't in any way faced with a
barrier to protecting themselves and their family. So we actually
work with communities and we take our lead from community

(07:11):
partners so that the people that they serve can get
the best possible care. We obviously also look at policy issues,
and so we're in Washington, d C. Fighting constantly for
the rights of healthcare, to make sure that healthcare is affordable,
that the Affordable Care Act stays in place, so that
people can continue to have health care. We cut the

(07:35):
uninsured rate drastically years ago when the Affordable Care Act
was enacted. We have to protect that. And we're defending Medicaid. Dennis.
I don't know if you know this, but nearly half
of all babies that are born in the US are
covered under Medicaid. If Medicaid goes away, imagine what will
happen to those babies and to those moms. So we're

(07:58):
are also every day at the federal and state level
fighting to protect Medicaid for patients.

Speaker 2 (08:04):
Well, and I'm glad you brought that up, because you've
got at least two fights on your hands. You've got
the one you just talked about, but you also got
the one as far as educating the public. And in
the thirty years that I've been in the media, and
I'm on the sports side and I do a little
bit news, but sports has been my background. I've never
seen where we are not only in the kind of
debate world that we are in the two different sides,

(08:24):
but what is the real facts and what are the
second set of facts? And as you taking this new
gig on, and I know you knew this going into it,
that you know knowledge is power, and as you try
and get your message out there, and as you try
to advocate, you're also fighting that, well, we got a
set of news here that people are saying it's correct,
and then the set of news that you know is correct.

(08:45):
And I imagine if you'd like to expound on a
little bit of what that's like to take that on,
because its own set of issues, isn't it?

Speaker 1 (08:53):
It really is? And we're constantly fighting disinformation and misinformation.
There are those who just don't know until we're always
sort of trying to clarify what is really true and
factual around health. And then there are those who are
deliberately trying to change the narrative. And so what we
spend a lot of time doing is bringing data and

(09:15):
science to the narrative, uplifting the stories of people in
community who can say, yes, this did actually work for me.
I did face this issue, and because of the work
of community catalysts, I was able to get care. But
we need people to understand what they're entitled to, so
we spend a lot of time helping them understand what

(09:35):
you're entitled to when it comes to your health care,
your insurance, what happens with your employer, and to interpret
what they may be exposed to in media, social media,
mainstream media so that they can make the best choices
for themselves and their family. It takes a lot of
time and energy to be because this work never ends.

(09:56):
There's always some other new bit of myths or dis
information that we've got to combat against. But we're not
going to stop. We have to make sure people have
information that they need to be as healthy as possible,
and that it is as factual as possible, and that
they can ignore or disregard all of the other attempts

(10:17):
to lead them around along a path that one won't
result in their making the best choices for their healthcare.

Speaker 2 (10:24):
I'd like to circle back to advocation, and I know
that's just a really high priority, not only Capitol Hill,
but you've got fifty states to work with. Everybody's a
little different. You've got federal and then you've got state laws.
So I imagine there are a lot of moving and
fluid parts for you and your team all the time
of just keeping up with the laws and what's happening,
but as you advocate for what's going on right now,
what's I know you're new into the jobs, so I

(10:47):
get that, and we'll give you a break because I
know you're on a learning curve right now. The new
gig is President of Community Catalysts. But when it comes
to advocating, what does that look like for you? What
are you and your team doing right now?

Speaker 1 (10:57):
Well, first we start with the facts what is in
our healthcare system. But I'll tell you one of the
most powerful tools and our advocacy is uplifting the stories
of our community partners. When you're a policymaker at the
state level or at the federal level, and you hear
I'm thinking about a community member of Florida who was hospitalized.

(11:24):
If she's doing her level best to be as healthy
as possible, she was hospitalized and then hit with a
nearly six hundred thousand dollars bill. Nobody explained to her
that this is what her care coused, that she was
going to be faced with this bill? What was she
going to do? So we were able to take stories
like hers and others to the state level and the

(11:46):
federal level to stay the policymakers this isn't fair. Knew.
Nobody could expect a nearly half a million dollar bill.
Nobody could expect that when they showed up at the
emergency department someone, they would say, oh, no, we can't
treat you. And then when they go to urgent care
they say, well, we don't take your insurance. So what
we try to make sure people have is the data

(12:08):
that they need so that their policymakers understand the impact
that this is having at the community level. Oftentimes, when
we talk about healthcare costs, we use these really big numbers,
like the healthcare industry costs two trillion dollars. I don't
think anybody knows what to do with that number. But
when you point to someone who says, I have a
medical bill that's five hundred thousand dollars and I make

(12:31):
thirty five thousand dollars a year, what am I supposed
to do? We're able to get policymakers and leaders and
those frankly whose hands are on the levels of power
to think about the people differently, and that's what this
is all about, you.

Speaker 2 (12:44):
Know, Linda. That also brings up a point I'd like
to talk about just briefly with you, because you're talking
about the micro there, and sometimes you need the micro
story to serve the macro that you're working with on
a federal level and the big picture. But to hear
those individual stories from people and families and the people
from Middle America that are having a tough time it's
paying their bills, I think it's paramount. Could you expand

(13:06):
on that a little bit for us?

Speaker 1 (13:08):
Yeah, you know, I think that that's everything. You know
that most of us walking around the street really aren't
thinking about policy. We're thinking about our jobs, our families,
our homes, how do we stay in them? You know,
what's next feeding our families? And and you know, I
think about some of the work that we do, particularly

(13:28):
around medical debt. You know, it is the leading cause
of bankruptcy in this country and most people don't don't
know that, but you know, we have so many stories.
I'm thinking of one where a homeowner was faced with
either losing his home or paying medical debt his medical bill. Well,
community catalysts for years work to make sure that a

(13:51):
medical debt didn't show up on your credit score, because
that could then prevent you from buying a home, or
getting a car, or frankly, getting your electricity turned on
in your apartment. And so that's why we bring to
your point these issues down to the individual level, because
this affects how people live. I mean, health is everything,

(14:11):
as we like to say, and if you can't have
access to health, and if you can't afford health, we're
looking at private equity firms buying physician practices and hospital systems,
and then of course they close the hospital and so
we lose access. We have to make sure that people
in community, and that's where our partners come in, understand

(14:33):
the implications of these kinds of decisions, these financial decisions
and policy decisions, so that we can fight against them
and keep people like Terry Belk in his home and
allow people to be able to do things like get
their gas and electricity turned down.

Speaker 2 (14:48):
Well, that is a great segue about being funded. I
know your nonprofit, but as you take a look, and
we'll talk about donations at the end, and also how
to do that and the website for everybody out there.
A lot of our listeners are probably already googled checked
it out, but we'll give that to you in just
a moment. But when it comes to funding donations, working
with different third parties, how does it all work for you?

Speaker 1 (15:09):
Well, for community catalysts being because we're a natural organization,
we're actually sort of on both sides of this. We
fund where we put money, financial and human resources in
the communities, but we also help philanthropy understand what is
actually going on so that we inform philanthropic strategy. So

(15:32):
what people you know, sort of refer to as charity,
we actually call investment. If people support us, whether it's
an individual or a foundation, they're investing in communities so
that they understand what we need to do to be
as healthy as possible, and our partners can advocate for
the members in their community, so what they're actually doing

(15:53):
is investing in improving health for those who have been
left out. We do both invest, we allocate resources. We
evaluate the issues so that we help big philanthropy understands
from a strategic perspective where resources need to go, and
we also understand the healthcare funding landscape so that anyone

(16:15):
who's interested in wanting to improve healthcare access can get
fascial information from us. So whether we're developing grassroots leadership
or narrative change or innovations in care, it doesn't matter.
It's those partnerships at the community level and at the
higher funded level in alignment with our values and our

(16:37):
mission to make sure that people have access to affordable,
quality care that matters. So we like to say it's
not charity, it's impact.

Speaker 2 (16:45):
I like that. I like that a lot, Linda. How
many on staff there?

Speaker 1 (16:49):
Oh, I think we are around eighty people now, so
we're pretty good sized.

Speaker 2 (16:54):
Well, what I want to ask you about because you
mentioned leadership and in this series there's a lot of
future entrepreneurs and people that are going to be running
for profit and nonprofits out there, and leadership is always
something I love to talk about with people like you,
especially the extensive resume that you've had in your arena
with nonprofits and eighty people. But it's much larger than that,
because you've talked about, you know, the federal landscape and

(17:16):
the state landscape and all that you do. So there's
a lot of moving parts and I'm curious, especially with
the way we are in history right now, Linda, the
world's on fire. I think we can all agree that.
I know there's a lot of happy people, but there's
also a lot of unhappy people and a lot of
unrest going on right now. And for what you do,
and I know it's very historic what's going on right

(17:36):
now as you lead your team of eighty and more.
You know, I'll give you the analogy because I'm a
sports guy. A coach is there to make sure that
nobody loses their head in the fourth quarter, that you
stay focused and you finish the game plan off to
the best of your ability. With that said, you know
you're the same. You're the coach with your eighty staff
and more. And there's a lot of people probably worried

(17:59):
out there, maybe having a really rough day. I wanted
to know what leadership means to you in your new
role and how you deal with all that's going on
on a daily basis.

Speaker 1 (18:10):
You know, that is such a good question, Dennis, and
I love your sports analogy. You know. My approach is,
you know, yes, at the end of the day, I'm
making the decisions, but the leadership team leads together. I mean,
just as a coach, the coach, she has her assistance coaches.
You know, she's got a whole team around her that

(18:32):
helps make get that team to where it needs to
be and successful. But what she does first is she
articulates where she wants that team to go. She's she's
clear on the mission, she's clear on the vision, and
you know what she does is she trusts her team
to deliver against that mission and vision. So she's steering,
but everybody's working and she makes sure that everybody understands

(18:55):
just how valuable their contribution is. You know from sports.
You know, if you're let me just pick the knicks
right now. Thibadeau's on his way out, but it wasn't
only him. He's leaving for another reason. But pick a coach.
It's not just one person, it is the team. And
so at community catalysts, we've got a vision, we've got

(19:16):
a mission, we've got strategies to get to what success
looks like, and success is being defined. We have to
be clear on what success looks like so that we
understand it. But we also translated to our community partners
and then hear from them, well, here's what success looks
like in our community, so we can then bring our
considerable talent, time and treasure to work with our partners

(19:40):
to make sure that they're successful, because if they're successful,
we're successful.

Speaker 2 (19:44):
That's really well said. And if you could talk about
one more thing, because once again, and this doesn't apply
just to sports, even though that's my background, is culture,
and I think what you were alluding to is culture,
you know, being honest and forthright, not mincing words, but
being appropriately can and then all the things to go
without leadership. And you also talked about team, which is
a reoccurring theme in our series of CEOs, presidents and

(20:06):
founders of companies. They would be nothing without their team.
But can you talk about culture, especially for where you're
at right now?

Speaker 1 (20:13):
Sure, Dennis, I think any CEO nos culture starts from
the top if you start by trusting your team, by
valuing their team, showing them how you value them, showing
them that you not only want their opinions, trust that
they have the expertise, but act on it so that
they have a clear example of yes, my leader trusts me.

(20:36):
That's how you build a culture, because then they do
that with their teams, and their teams do that with
their teams. I don't think an organization can success successfully
meet any mission or vision without trust, without valuing the
people that they work with. Doesn't mean that you all
have to be best friends, as you know, but you

(20:58):
do have to communicate that I believe that you've got
the skill set to do this work. We've articulated where
we want to go, and I'm trusting all of us
to work together in service of this mission and vision.
And you know, whether it's a sports team, whether it's
a for profit or nonprofit, that has to be the guide.
We are a team, and we trust each other to

(21:19):
have the our mission and vision first, are people first,
and that we're committed and showing each other how we
are committed, not only to the organization, but to making
sure that each of us can perform to the best
of our abilities.

Speaker 2 (21:35):
That's well said in one final thing that I'll put
on top of this on A word you have and
you use, but I'll use for us. And I've heard
it into my industry about myself and I'm seeing it
as I meet and talk to you, is passion for
what you do because people feed off of that. I
always use that example, Linda that when you go to
a party, who do you want to hang out with
the person that has their head down in the corner

(21:55):
that's not talking to anybody, or the person's in the
middle of the room telling a joke and everybody laughing
and surrounding them. Right, It's all about passion.

Speaker 1 (22:03):
It is all about passion. And I have to tell
you I am as CEOs go. I am so fortunate
that I'm surrounded by people who are passionate about these issues,
passionate about making sure people can be as healthy as possible.
The beauty of community canalysts is everyone there could do
something else if it works someplace else. They have chosen

(22:25):
community catalysts because of that passion, because they believe that
we all can be healthy, and that health isn't right,
and that they have a role in making that a reality.

Speaker 2 (22:36):
All right, well, listen, let's do this. I want to
do a recap of what we chatted about, get some
final thoughts from you, and also give the website. It's
a gorgeous website, folks, It's easy to navigate. There's a
lot of information on there. But let's do this, Linda,
just what we talked about, some final thoughts from you,
and recap.

Speaker 1 (22:52):
The floor is yours, Okay, well, thank you so, Denzel.
As you said this, we are in some difficult times.
Healthcare is under attack from a number of different fronts.
But the thing that we know is that our own polding,
our own information shows that the vast majority of people

(23:13):
in this country, over seventy percent, feel that it should
be a right, and they feel that it's too expensive.
And so what we need to do is figure out
how to get healthcare two people who need it, who
are being left out, in a way that is quality
and affordable. And that's what Community Catalyst is about, and
to remove those barriers that would determine our health outcomes

(23:36):
in adverse ways, like racism, like gender discrimination, like economic inequality.
So what people need to know is there's a national
organization that's fighting every single day at the community level,
building power at community, at the community level, and at
the federal level, helping to set policy. So if they're interested,

(23:58):
and if they feel like healthcare is right, and if
they ever looked at their own families and thought, how
we're really having a hard time taking care of this
healthcare issue and paying all of these other bills, and
we're hard working, we're doing the things that we should
do and yet it's still a challenge. Then go to
Community Catalyst dot org, find out about our work, donate

(24:19):
to us, make that investment in healthcare in this country.
It is in the healthcare of all of us. And
pay attention to what is being said in the media.
What is fact, what is fiction? And you know, I
would just invite people to join us at the community
level or the federal level. This is going to take

(24:41):
a while. This will not be a short fight, Dennis,
as you know, but we're in it for the long haul,
and we're in it to make sure that people have
access to the care that they need and understand what
they really are entitled to.

Speaker 2 (24:54):
All right, Well, Linda, thank you so much for your
valuable time. I can see why Community Catalysts shows you
and why you've chosen them. I know you're new into
the role, but your bounty of work speaks for itself,
and I know that good things are going to happen
with a very hard fight ahead of you. Give my
best to the team. Thank you so much. Continued success
and we really appreciate featuring you on CEOs. You should know.

Speaker 1 (25:15):
Thank you so much, Dennis. It's been my pleasure