Feb. 27–29, 2024
We are pleased to announce some exciting changes to the annual Healthcare Analytics Summit (HAS). We are always listening to our attendees’ thoughtful feedback, observing healthcare industry trends, and strategizing how to make each year’s event the best yet. Since the conference last September, we have been hard at work planning a re-imagined and improved HAS. Due to a number of factors, we will be moving HAS to February 27-29, 2024. While there are many positive changes associated with this date adjustment (including access to world-class skiing in Utah!), rest assured that the key components of HAS you know and love will remain the same!
“This conference still sets the bar for what I would consider the most entertaining and informative conference. Love the mix of presenters and real-time feedback.”
Penny Wheeler, MD
Former CEO, Allina Health
One of the highest-rated HAS keynote speakers ever, Dr. Penny Wheeler will share data, experiences, and stories of data-driven healthcare that embraces the human side of analytics.Marzyeh Ghassemi, MSc, PhD
Artificial Intelligence Professor and Researcher
Health is important, and improvements in health improve lives. However, we still don’t fundamentally understand what it means to be healthy, and the same patient may receive different treatments across different hospitals or clinicians as new evidence is discovered, or individual illness is interpreted. Dr. Marzyeh Ghassemi explores questions about eradicating...Elana Meyers Taylor
Five-Time Olympic Medalist, USA Bobsled
Elana Meyers Taylor is a five-time Olympic Medalist and the most decorated athlete of color to ever compete in the Olympic Winter Games. She was elected by Team USA to carry the American flag at both the opening and closing ceremonies, becoming the first athlete in history to be named Flag Bearer for both. She will share a stunning story of resilience ...Shawn Achor
Top Emotional Intelligence Speaker, Happiness Researcher, Bestselling Author of The Happiness Advantage
The most successful healthcare analytic organizations have discovered the importance of healthy, positive multi-team dynamics. Shawn has become one of the world’s leading experts on the connection between happiness and success. A decade of research shows that training your brain to be...Matthew Luhn
Former Lead Animator and Storyteller, Pixar Studios
Kedar Mate, MD
President and CEO, Institute for Healthcare Improvement
Jill Hoggard Green, PhD, RN
President and CEO, The Queen's Health System
Brent James, MD, MStat
Clinical Professor, Clinical Excellence Research Center (CERC), Department of Medicine, Stanford University School of Medicine
Marcus Collins, DBA, MBA
Top Booked Speaker, DE&I Thought Leader; Head of Strategy, Wieden+Kennedy
Taylor Davis, MStat, MBA
President, KLAS Research
Talithia Williams
Host of the PBS series NOVA Wonders
Jia Jiang
Top Inspirational and Emotional Intelligence Speaker
Ford Koles, Jr.
Vice President and National Spokesperson, Advisory Board
Athlete and Advocate
Simone Biles is one of the greatest female athletes of all-time. The first woman to capture five All-Around World Championship titles, Biles is the most decorated gymnast in World Championships history – male or female – with 25 medals overall (19 gold) and is a seven-time Olympic medalist (four gold, one silver, two bronze). A three-time Laureus World Sportswoman of the Year, she has earned the rare distinction of having four skills named in her honor – The Biles – across beam, floor (two) and vault disciplines. Biles’ extraordinary accomplishments have received widespread recognition including TIME 100 Most Influential, Forbes 30 Under 30, Ebony Power 100, People Women Changing the World, USA Today 100 Women of the Century, and two-time Associated Press Female Athlete of the Year among others. Her autobiography – Courage to Soar – was a New York Times bestseller and developed into an award-winning tv special on Lifetime and her documentary series – Simone vs Herself – that streamed on Facebook Watch is nominated for a Sports Emmy Award. Biles utilizes her platform to help advocate for mental health and support initiatives that provide education and assistance for children and young adults associated with adoption and foster care.
Simone Biles is one of the greatest female athletes of all-time. The first woman to capture five All-Around World Championship titles, Biles is the most decorated gymnast in World Championships history – male or female – with 25 medals overall (19 gold) and is a seven-time Olympic medalist (four gold, one silver, two bronze). A three-time Laureus World Sportswoman of the Year, she has earned the rare distinction of having four skills named in her honor – The Biles – across beam, floor (two) and vault disciplines. Biles’ extraordinary accomplishments have received widespread recognition including TIME 100 Most Influential, Forbes 30 Under 30, Ebony Power 100, People Women Changing the World, USA Today 100 Women of the Century, and two-time Associated Press Female Athlete of the Year among others. Her autobiography – Courage to Soar – was a New York Times bestseller and developed into an award-winning tv special on Lifetime and her documentary series – Simone vs Herself – that streamed on Facebook Watch is nominated for a Sports Emmy Award. Biles utilizes her platform to help advocate for mental health and support initiatives that provide education and assistance for children and young adults associated with adoption and foster care.
Former CEO, Allina Health
One of the highest-rated HAS keynote speakers ever, Dr. Penny Wheeler will share data, experiences, and stories of data-driven healthcare that embraces the human side of analytics.
Penny Wheeler, MD, served as the chief executive officer of Allina Health from 2015 to 2021 and is a member of the board of directors. Prior to her appointment as CEO, she served as president and chief clinical officer of Allina Health, responsible for leading the organization’s quality and value agenda through alignment of the clinical and operational leadership to optimally benefit those served by Allina Health. A board-certified obstetrician/gynecologist, Dr. Wheeler served patients at Women’s Health Consultants in Minneapolis, was the president of Abbott Northwestern Hospital’s medical staff, chaired the Allina Health Quality Committee and served on the Allina Health Board of Directors.
Dr. Wheeler continues to set the overall strategic direction for Allina Health, ensuring the organization delivers exceptional care and supports the health and well-being of all those served.
Under Dr. Wheeler’s leadership, Allina Health has sharpened its focus on serving those who have not always been well-served by a health care system. This includes individuals with disabilities through the creation of Courage Kenny Rehabilitation Institute; those with mental illness and addiction issues through significant investments in Allina Health’s mental health capabilities; and those who face discrimination on the basis of race, ethnicity, sexual orientation or gender identity through Allina Health’s diversity, equity, and inclusion work.
Dr. Wheeler serves on a variety of local and national Boards. She is currently Chairing the American Hospital Association’s Health Systems Council; and serves on the Boards for NRC Health and Cedar, an organization that eases the strain of financial billing for those served. Locally, Dr. Wheeler serves on the Executive Committee of the Minnesota Business Partnership, Medical Alley, the University of Minnesota Foundation, St. Thomas University Board of Trustees, and Portico Healthnet, an organization dedicated to helping uninsured Minnesotans receive affordable health coverage and care.
Dr. Wheeler was recently recognized as a Luminary by Modern Health Care for her multiple appearances on their top 25 Women Leaders in Health Care list. In addition, she received an award as one of the 100 most influential people in health care and was recognized as one of the 50 most influential clinical executives.
Her educational background includes an undergraduate degree with honors from the University of Minnesota, and a doctorate of medicine degree from the University of Minnesota Medical School.
Artificial Intelligence Professor and Researcher
Health is important, and improvements in health improve lives. However, we still don’t fundamentally understand what it means to be healthy, and the same patient may receive different treatments across different hospitals or clinicians as new evidence is discovered, or individual illness is interpreted.
Dr. Marzyeh Ghassemi explores questions about eradicating bias in healthcare data and models, and understanding what it means to be healthy across different populations.
Marzyeh completed her PhD at MIT where her research focused on machine learning in healthcare, exploring how to predict immediate and long-term patient needs to inform decisions in the intensive care unit and ambulatory care. Her current research interests include clinical risk prediction with semi-supervised learning, optimal treatment discovery using expert demonstrations, and non-invasive patient phenotyping for behavioral conditions. Prior to MIT, she received a B.S. degree in computer science and electrical engineering at New Mexico State University as a Goldwater Scholar and Master’s degree in biomedical engineering from Oxford University as a Marshall Scholar. Marzyeh is on the Board of Women in Machine Learning (WiML), and co-organized both the NIPS 2016/2017 Workshop on Machine Learning for Health and MIT’s first Hacking Discrimination event.
Five-Time Olympic Medalist, USA Bobsled
Elana Meyers Taylor is a five-time Olympic Medalist and the most decorated athlete of color to ever compete in the Olympic Winter Games. She was elected by Team USA to carry the American flag at both the opening and closing ceremonies, becoming the first athlete in history to be named Flag Bearer for both. She will share a stunning story of resilience through childbirth trauma, caring for her newborn son with special needs, isolating with COVID, all while training and competing for the Olympic Games.
The daughter of a professional football player, Elana was born in Oceanside, California, but grew up in Douglasville, Georgia. A naturally gifted athlete across many sports, she was drawn to softball and by the time she was nine years old, she declared her intention to become an Olympian. She attended George Washington University on a softball scholarship and went on to play professionally for the Mid-Michigan Ice. After what she calls “the worst tryout ever in the history of tryouts” for the US Olympic Softball Team, it appeared her Olympic dreams were over.
It was her parents who saw bobsled on TV and suggested she give it a try. That turned out to be great advice. In the summer of 2007 she made the trip to Lake Placid, NY, home of the US National Bobsled Team. She never left. Elana turned out to be an incredibly powerful brakeman and less than three years later she stood on the podium in Vancouver as an Olympic Bronze Medalist.
Post Vancouver, Elana decided to take the wheel, or in the case of the bobsled, the ‘D-rings’, and transition to the role of driver. That too turned out to be a great decision. Not long after, she became a regular on medals’ podiums around the world, and eventually drove herself all the way back to the Olympic podium in 2014, this time in Sochi, Russia, and this time for silver. Later that year, she became Elana Meyers Taylor, marrying fellow bobsled athlete, Nic Taylor.
In 2015, Elana made history, becoming the first woman to earn a spot on the US National Team competing with the men, as part of a four-man bobsled pilot. She went on to become the first woman to win a medal in international competition in a men’s event. That same year, she won the World Championships in the two-woman event, the first woman in U.S. history to do so. In 2018, at the Olympic Games in PyeongChang, Elana battled back and forth with Team Germany over the four heat Olympic competition, missing the gold medal by just .07.
On February 8, 2020, Elana and Nic welcomed their first child, Nico, into the world. Nico was born with Down syndrome and severe hearing loss and spent the first week of his life fighting to survive. The following winter, Nico and his parents began traveling the world in pursuit of another few minutes on the Olympic podium for Elana, for the first time as a mother. After a grueling final year leading into the 2022 Olympics–including a last minute positive Covid test just as the Olympics began–Elana made her way back to the podium not once, but twice, winning silver in the inaugural Mono-bob competition, and bronze in the two-woman competition. In doing so, she once again made history, become the most decorated black athlete in the history of the Olympic Winter Games.
Top Emotional Intelligence Speaker, Happiness Researcher, Bestselling Author of The Happiness Advantage
The most successive healthcare analytic organizations have discovered the importance of healthy, positive multi-team dynamics.
Shawn has become one of the world’s leading experts on the connection between happiness and success. A decade of research shows that training your brain to be positive at work first actually fuels greater success second. In fact, 75% of our job success is predicted not by intelligence but by your optimism, social support network, and the ability to manage energy and stress positively.
Shawn Achor is the New York Times bestselling author of The Happiness Advantage and Before Happiness. He spent 12 years at Harvard, where he won over a dozen distinguished teaching awards and delivered lectures on positive psychology in the most popular class at Harvard. Shawn graduated magna cum laude from Harvard and earned a master’s from Harvard Divinity School in Christian and Buddhist ethics. Shawn has since become one of the world’s leading experts on the connection between happiness and success. Shawn has now worked with over a third of the Fortune 100 companies, and with places like the NFL, the Pentagon and the U.S. Treasury. To do his work, Shawn has traveled to 51 countries, speaking to farmers in Zimbabwe, CEOs in China, doctors in Dubai and schoolchildren in South Africa. In 2014, Oprah Winfrey did a two-hour interview with Shawn on the science of happiness and meaning. His research on happiness made the cover of Harvard Business Review, his TED talk is one of the most popular of all time with over 11 million views, and his lecture airing on PBS has been seen by millions.
Former Lead Animator and Storyteller, Pixar Studios
The most effective analysts have learned that data is more memorable and actionable when wrapped in a story that is personal and impactful. Matthew is one of the most popular speakers in the U.S. today. He works with companies of all sizes to help professionals craft and tell stories that bridge the gap between business and heart to build strong brands and business communication.
Matthew Luhn is an accomplished storyteller, instructor, motivational keynote speaker, and story consultant, with over 20 years’ experience creating stories and characters at Pixar Animation Studios. Alongside his story work in Hollywood, Matthew works with Fortune 500 companies, entrepreneurs, and other professionals how to craft and tell stories that bridge the gap between business and heart to build stronger brands and business communication. Matthew’s most recent clients include Adidas, Target, Coke, Procter and Gamble, Facebook, Warner Brothers, Sony, and Google.
Matthew’s story credits include Toy Story, Toy Story 2, Toy Story 3, Monsters Inc., Monsters University, Finding Nemo, UP, Cars, Ratatouille and other films currently in development.
With over 20 years experience creating and developing dozens of films, TV shows, and video games, at Pixar, The Simpsons, ILM, and other studios, Matthew Luhn knows what it takes to create memorable stories with enduring characters. From filmmaking to business, Matthew’s story talks are beneficial to anybody wanting to improve their story skills, or learn the persuasion of great storytelling. In Matthew’s story seminar, he will share his process for creating new ideas and characters, how to develop great stories and story structure, and how to realize your story ideas from script to storyboards to finished product. and business communication.
President and CEO, Institute for Healthcare Improvement
Modern health care delivery can make a real difference to saving or improving lives. Often, however, those with the greatest needs, and the largest potential gains, have been beyond our reach. We have come to see differences as entrenched and inevitable. The last several years has seen a growing conversation about the importance of health equity. The real challenge, though, is transforming those “grand ideas” into actual change and real, measured, results. This conversation will be a step in that direction – how to start the journey from data and analytics toward achieving the biggest impacts for those with the greatest healthcare needs.
Kedar Mate, MD, is the President and Chief Executive Officer at the Institute for Healthcare Improvement (IHI), President of the Lucian Leape Institute, and a member of the faculty at Weill Cornell Medical College. Dr. Mate’s scholarly work has focused on health system design, health care quality, strategies for achieving large-scale change, and approaches to improving value. Previously Dr. Mate worked at Partners In Health, the World Health Organization, Brigham and Women’s Hospital, and served as IHI’s Chief Innovation and Education Officer. Dr. Mate has published numerous peer-reviewed articles, book chapters and white papers and has received multiple honors including serving as a Soros Fellow, Fulbright Specialist, Zetema Panelist, and an Aspen Institute Health Innovators Fellow. He graduated from Brown University with a degree in American History and from Harvard Medical School with a medical degree. You can follow him on twitter at @KedarMate
President and CEO, The Queen's Health System
Jill Hoggard Green, PhD, RN was appointed President and Chief Executive Officer of The Queen’s Health System (QHS) on September 30, 2019.
Under Dr. Hoggard Green’s leadership, QHS has taken effective steps to improve quality, coordinate care and reduce unnecessary costs, grown in market share, rolled out several innovations at a rapid pace, and achieved a positive operating margin. Additionally, Dr. Hoggard Green led QHS’ three-party Affiliation Agreement with The University of Hawai‘i John A. Burns School of Medicine and University Health Partners, creating Queen’s University Medical Group that will enhance education and training for the next generation of health care professionals and improve care delivery models for the residents of Hawaii.
Before joining QHS, Dr. Hoggard Green served as Chief Operating Officer of Mission Health and President of Mission Hospital in Asheville, North Carolina. Mission Health, a Top 15 Health System by IBM Watson Health in six of seven years (2012-2018), is a $2 billion, 12,000-employee health system comprised of six hospitals, including a 770-bed teaching hospital, multiple ambulatory care facilities, an 800+ provider group practice, a $100+ million post-acute provider, a health plan, and related services. While at Mission, Dr. Hoggard Green was twice named one of 130 Women Hospital and Health System Leaders to Know by Becker’s Hospital Review (2016, 2017) and one of the Top 25 COO’s by Modern Healthcare (2018).
Prior to Mission Health, Dr. Hoggard Green served as Chief Operating Officer of the Oregon Region of Peace Health and spent more than 15 years at Intermountain Healthcare in Salt Lake City, Utah, a nationally recognized, vertically integrated not-for-profit health system.
Dr. Hoggard Green has dedicated her life to improving patient care. A registered nurse, her career includes work with the oncology and bone marrow transplant units at a Level I trauma facility and at leading hospitals, ambulatory and home health services in Alaska, Washington and Oregon. She received a Bachelor of Science (nursing), Master of Science, and Doctor of Philosophy (concentration in health system leadership, quality and models of care) from the University of Utah in Salt Lake City.
Dr. Hoggard Green has been involved in numerous community service and professional organizations, including the Make-A-Wish Foundation and YWCA. Currently, she serves on the boards of Child and Family Service (CFS), Hawaii Cancer Consortium, Hawaii Homeless Healthcare Hui (H4 Hawaii) and the Girl Scouts of Hawai`i in addition to serving on the Joint Commission Board of Commissioners.
In 2021, Dr. Hoggard Green was recognized as one of the 50 Most Influential Clinical Executives by Modern Healthcare.
Clinical Professor, Clinical Excellence Research Center (CERC), Department of Medicine, Stanford University School of Medicine
Modern health care delivery can make a real difference to saving or improving lives. Often, however, those with the greatest needs, and the largest potential gains, have been beyond our reach. We have come to see differences as entrenched and inevitable. The last several years has seen a growing conversation about the importance of health equity. The real challenge, though, is transforming those “grand ideas” into actual change and real, measured, results. This conversation will be a step in that direction – how to start the journey from data and analytics toward achieving the biggest impacts for those with the greatest healthcare needs.
Brent James is known internationally for his work in clinical quality improvement, patient safety, and the infrastructure that underlies successful improvement efforts, such as culture change, data systems, payment methods, and management roles. He is a member of the National Academy of Medicine (formerly known as the Institute of Medicine), and participated in that organization’s seminal works on quality and patient safety. He is a Clinical Professor at the Clinical Excellence Research Center (CERC), Department of Medicine, Stanford University School of Medicine.
He is a Fellow of the American College of Physician Executives. He is presently a Senior Advisor at Health Catalyst, Salt Lake City, UT; Senior Fellow at the Institute for Healthcare Improvement (IHI), Boston, MA; and a Senior Advisor at the Leavitt Group, Salt Lake City, UT. He was formerly Chief Quality Officer, and Executive Director, Institute for Healthcare Delivery Research at Intermountain Healthcare, based in Salt Lake City, Utah. Through the Intermountain Advanced Training Program in Clinical Practice Improvement (ATP), he has personally trained more than 5,000 senior physician, nursing, and administrative executives, drawn from around the world, in clinical management methods, with proven improvement results (and leading to over 50 “sister” training programs in more than 10 countries).
He has been honored with a series of awards for quality in health care delivery, including (among many):
For 8 of first the 9 years it existed, he was named among Modern Physician’s “50 Most Influential Physician Executives in Healthcare.” He was named among the “100 Most Powerful People in Healthcare” (Modern Healthcare) for over 5 consecutive years, and among Modern Healthcare’s “25 Top Clinical Informaticists”.
Before coming to Utah in 1986, he was Assistant Professor in the Department of Biostatistics at the Harvard School of Public Health, providing statistical support for the Eastern Cooperative Oncology Before coming to Utah in 1986, he was Assistant Professor in the Department of Biostatistics at the Harvard School of Public Health, providing statistical support for the Eastern Cooperative Oncology Group (ECOG) and Cancer & Leukemia, Group B (CALG); and staffed the American College of Surgeons’ Commission on Cancer.
He holds the following degrees; Bachelor of Science degrees in Computer Science (Electrical Engineering) and Medical Biology; an M.D. degree (with residency training in general surgery and oncology); and a Master of Statistics degree. He serves on several non-profit boards of trustees dedicated to clinical improvement and patient safety.
Top Booked Speaker, DE&I Thought Leader; Head of Strategy, Wieden+Kennedy
The best data-driven insights don’t matter and don’t affect behavior unless they are communicated broadly and appropriately. In today’s hyper-connected world, the allure of “going viral” continues to seduce idea-generators into investing significant time and resources toward the creation of content – videos, memes, tweets, posts, etc. – that spreads. Though there are benefits to “going viral,” one must wonder if virality is truly what we’re after or if perhaps there is something far greater worth pursuing. This session reframes the benefits of “going viral” and provides an alternative aim. It explores the impact of culture on consumer behavior and offers an actionable framework that enables you to create ideas/messages/products/content that not only spread but also take hold in the culture of your health system.
Top Booked Speaker, DE&I Thought Leader, Head of Strategy Wieden+Kennedy, AAF Advertising Hall of Achievement Inductee, 2022 Cannes Lions Jury Member and expert on Cultural Contagion – getting your message and brand to go viral.
Marcus Collins is an award-winning marketer and cultural translator with one foot in the world of practice—serving as the Head of Strategy at Wieden+Kennedy New York—and one foot in the world of academia—as a marketing professor at the Ross School of Business, University of Michigan.
His deep understanding of brand strategy and consumer behavior has helped him bridge the academic-practitioner gap for blue-chip brands and startups alike. He is a recipient of Advertising Age’s 40 Under 40 award and Crain’s Business’ 40 Under 40 award, and a recent inductee into the American Advertising Federation’s Advertising Hall of Achievement. Before joining Wieden+Kennedy, he served as the Chief Consumer Connections Officer at Doner Advertising and led Social Engagement at Steve Stoute’s advertising agency, Translation. Over the course of his career, Marcus has developed a practice for creating culturally contagious ideas that inspire people to take action. His strategies and creative contributions have led to the launch and success of Budweiser’s “Made In America” music festival, the Brooklyn Nets (Hello Brooklyn!), and State Farm’s “Cliff Paul” campaign – among others.
Prior to his advertising tenure, Marcus began his career in music and tech with a startup he co-founded before working on iTunes + Nike sport music initiatives at Apple and running digital strategy for Beyoncé.
Marcus holds a doctorate in marketing from Temple University where he studied cultural contagion and meaning-making. He received an MBA with an emphasis on strategic brand marketing from the University of Michigan, where he also earned his undergraduate degree in Material Science Engineering. He is a proud Detroit native, a devoted husband, and a loving father to Georgia and Ivy. He has spoken for Fortune 1000 companies such as Google, United Healthcare, PepsiCo and Fannie Mae.
President, KLAS Research
Efforts to embed AI and analytics into healthcare have been hit and miss. Why?
After thousands of customer interviews, what is the KLAS anticipation for the future state of healthcare analytics and AI.
What will successful healthcare organizations need to focus on? How will vendors support this revolution?
Taylor Davis recently became the President of KLAS Research (in October 2021). Before this role he was the founder of both KLAS consulting services and the KLAS Arch Collaborative.
Taylor has played a leadership role in nearly all KLAS research lines, writing many KLAS reports over the years, running many KLAS Summits, and leading consulting engagements with over 250 provider and vendor executive leadership teams. In his time at KLAS, Taylor has conducted over 4,000 interviews with healthcare executives and leaders.
With a master’s degree in Statistics from Texas A&M and an MBA from Brigham Young University, as well as experience as an adjunct professor, consultant and speaker, Taylor loves the opportunity KLAS gives him to, “Tell the truth for a living.”
Host of the PBS series NOVA Wonders
Dr. Williams makes a compelling case that healthcare providers should encourage patients to measure and record simple data about their bodies daily. Based upon her hit TED Talk, “Own Your Body’s Data,” Dr. Williams shares how patients should be monitoring their personal data by using both everyday technologies and high-tech wearables. With these devices, healthcare consumers can easily quantify everything from heart rate and sleep patterns to body temperature and fertility. However, what is the average patient to do with the massive amounts of data being collected? Dr. Williams believes empowered patients sharing this information with their healthcare providers not only strengthens doctor-patient dialog but also enhances patient outcomes.
A host of the PBS series, NOVA Wonders, Dr. Talithia Williams is a groundbreaking professor, popular TED speaker, inspiring author and passionate STEM/STEAM advocate. She has made it her life’s work to get people of all ages and backgrounds excited about the bold possibilities of a STEM education and to “STEMpower” women and minorities to enter these professions. Her latest book, Power in Numbers: The Rebel Women of Mathematics reflects Williams’ passion to re-brand the field of mathematics as anything but dry, technical or male-dominated. Renowned for her popular TED Talk, “Own Your Body’s Data,” she advocates for all of us to deploy data as a way of taking charge of our own health. A vibrant, engaging and energizing speaker, Dr. Williams demystifies data, statistics, probabilities and the mathematical process in amusing and insightful ways. She also passionately champions the contributions of scientists, technologists, engineers and mathematicians and their vital role in transforming our future.
Dr. Williams is Associate Dean for Research and Experiential Learning and Associate Professor of Mathematics at Harvey Mudd College, where she develops statistical models which emphasize the spatial and temporal structure of data, and applies them to real world problems. Focused on data analytics, mathematics, statistical modeling and STEM Outreach, she is the first African-American woman to achieve tenure at the college. She hosts NOVA Wonders, a PBS mini-series that explores the biggest questions on the frontiers of science. The Los Angeles Times praised the show for sending the message “that scientists come in a range of ages, genders, colors and hairstyles.” She also appeared in NOVA’s Prediction by the Numbers, a series exploring the history of probabilities and gambling which Forbes called, “an entertaining, fun piece that conveys her knowledgeable and deep interest in this predictive method.” In addition to her teaching and television work, she has partnered with the World Health Organization in developing a cataract model used to predict the cataract surgical rate for countries in Africa. Her professional experiences include research appointments at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, NASA’s Johnson Space Center, and the National Security Agency.
An exceptional communicator and gifted teacher, Dr. Williams won the Mathematical Association of America’s Henry L. Alder Award for distinguished teaching. She also developed a 24-part college level lecture series on learning statistics for The Great Courses, an online platform
Dr. Williams earned a bachelor’s degree in mathematics from Spelman College, a master’s degree in mathematics from Howard University and a Ph.D. in statistics from Rice University. Described by audiences as engaging, relevant, funny, accessible, and a joy to work with, Dr. Williams captivates and inspires with her contagious enthusiasm for STEM in general and math in particular. Applying the data-driven approach made famous in her TED talk to a range of subjects, she takes sophisticated numerical concepts and makes them understandable to a wide audience, debunking perceptions with an energizing call to “show me the data!”
Topics:
Top Inspirational and Emotional Intelligence Speaker
Data-driven analytics can require tenacity, especially when faced with the inevitable failure of data, analytics, or interventions to make a positive impact. Or when recommendations are rejected by leaders or teams.
The fear of rejection can hold you back. Our natural tendency is to avoid it at all costs which can be detrimental to our businesses, careers, and lives. In 2012, to overcome his own fear of rejection, entrepreneur Jia Jiang started an experiment to be rejected every day for 100 days. The result became the basis of his #3 viewed TED talk of 2017 and bestselling book: Rejection Proof. In this engaging presentation, Jia shares stories from his rejection experiment to teach you the importance of becoming rejection-proof, the basic principles of turning a NO into YES, as well as how to get more YESes.
Top Inspirational and Emotional Intelligence Speaker, Winner of Toastmasters Golden Gavel Award, One of the Most Viewed TED Talks: 100 Days of Rejection
Jia Jiang is the owner of Rejection Therapy, a website that provides inspiration, knowledge and products for people to overcome their fear of rejection. He also teaches people and trains organizations to become fearless through rejection training. In 2015, he authored the Amazon bestselling book, Rejection Proof: How I Beat Fear and Became Invincible Through 100 Days of Rejection and was one of the most viewed TED Talks of 2017.
Several years after Jiang began his career in the corporate world, he took a life-altering risk and stepped into the unknown world of entrepreneurship. His result was everyone’s biggest fear: rejection. This was the catalyst that set Jiang on the path to his true calling.
To conquer the fear of rejection, Jiang embarked on a personal quest and started a blog, 100 Days of Rejection Therapy. His journey revealed a world that was hidden in plain sight — a world where people are much kinder than we imagine. He discovered that rejection can be much less painful than we believe and that the fear of rejection is much more destructive than we know.
Jiang grew up in Beijing, China and migrated to the United States at age 16. He holds a Bachelor of Computer Science from Brigham Young University and a Master of Business Administration from Duke University.
Vice President and National Spokesperson, Advisory Board
The healthcare industry right now is facing an increasingly tough business climate, dominated by increasing costs and prices, tightening margins and capital, and staffing upheaval. The array of urgent, disruptive market forces today means that leaders must navigate an unusually high number of short-term crises and opportunities. These pressures are easily distracting: for some, they are overwhelming, while they tempt others into overambitious initiatives. Leaders’ strategic choices now will have an outsized impact—positive or negative—on their trajectory toward long-term goals.
Specifically, we’ll focus the discussion on:
The disruptive market forces shaping the entire industry’s business environment for most healthcare organizations, including:
The strategic decision guideposts represent where leaders have the greatest agency to influence the future in multiple directions, including:
Ford is one of Advisory Board’s preeminent thought leaders in the area of health system economics and strategy and is the keynote speaker at the annual meetings for Advisory Board’s strategy membership. Ford is a health care economist by training and has participated in every major Advisory Board research initiative since 1992. He is well-versed in health care history and the many reform initiatives we have lived through in the past three decades: coverage expansion; vertical integration and physician partnership models; managed care and payer contracting; horizontal integration and system economics of scale; and quality-based payment.
We take pride in providing you with relevant, useful content. May we use cookies to track what you read? We take your privacy very seriously. Please see our privacy policy for details and any questions.