Humber River Health Foundation President and CEO Jennifer Stewart discusses her new role, responsibilities and goals.

There’s absolutely nothing truer than the adage that “What’s meant to be is bound to happen.” That certainly describes the journey of Humber River Health Foundation’s new president and CEO, Jennifer Stewart. Stewart grew up in a small town where there was only one hospital, which made health care immensely valued. She went on to pursue her honours degree in business, certain that she would become a banker. However, as destiny would have it, her first job was at a hospital foundation, and it felt like the Universe had brought her where she was meant to be.

She began to notice that she was returning home with a feeling of joy after work every day, which motivated her to take new roles in health care and philanthropy.

As someone who celebrates change, Stewart believes that doors open if you’re willing to work hard and try new things. It is that same grit and determination that inspired her path toward her current role. She describes how warm and welcoming the board of directors was in her first interview, and how every conversation flowed towards ideas about how to effect change.

Being the new CEO has imbued Stewart with a sense of elation. She views her position as a significant opportunity to change health care with an organization that has been setting trends for more than a decade.

Speaking of her own three decades in philanthropy, she shares how as a leader she is embracing her truest self. “I am reliable and relentless. I have full passion for the projects I take on and I bring joy to the table. If we can’t have fun raising money for health care in the world, why are we here?” she says.“Every day in health care and philanthropy is a pleasure. As a leader, I have always felt compelled to choose the right path, set the example, do what I say and say what I do — and get the job done.”

So this transformation has been an exhilarating experience for her. The Humber River Health Foundation has been forging a positive path to the future by building efficiencies, and it envisions growing the next capital campaign to $100 million for its investment in health care.

“I am reliable and relentless. I have full passion for the projects I take on, and I bring joy to the table. If we can’t have fun raising money for health care in the world, why are we here?”

Sharing her goals, Stewart says that she is working toward defining the Healthcare Lives campaign more concretely. She focuses on how the community, which speaks 20 different languages, needs support. For both her and the hospital, this is the main driving force for serving these communities.

Another important aspect of this journey is the contribution of the donors. Numbers don’t drive health care. Donors are motivated by making an impact and donors invest in impact. With the new campaign and its aspiration to bring change, Stewart is aiming to draw new donors into investing in the future.

Speaking of sustaining and building new connections, Stewart reflects on taking the time to talk to everyone, including donors, board members and staff. She stresses the importance of speaking with donors to understand why they’ve given in the past and to discuss how to forge the future with them.

“Numbers don’t drive health care. Donors are motivated by making an impact and donors invest in impact.”

She says the biggest challenge is the vast influence of issues related to the economy and how people react to political events. However, the silver lining is that people remain philanthropic, she notes. In 2008, even when the markets crashed, donors continued to give what they could because the causes they cared about still held a place in their hearts. She believes that economies and financial crises will always exist but so will hospitals, and that empathy is what drives donors to donate.

For Stewart, success is all about joyfully connecting with the cause, and she aspires to harness people’s collective pleasure and joy in achieving their goals and the change they desire.

She has achieved her dolce vita in her happy marriage, family and work. For Stewart, family is everything, what we leave behind as a legacy. A great deal of her happiness also comes from her work, in improving efficiencies in the hospital and enabling it to accommodate more patients. For her, the perfect life, one that combines family and work, is bliss.

INTERVIEW BY MARC CASTALDO

www.hrhfoundation.ca
@hrh_foundation

Q&A with Jennifer Stewart
Q: What defines a great, effective leader?
A: What defines an effective leader is doing what you say and saying what you do. You have to be able to see the path, forge the path. You have to make the hard decisions that will achieve your goal in the end. So, a great leader has integrity and honesty and is always reliable.

Q: How do you plan to strengthen existing donor relationships and forge new ones?
A: When a leader takes on a brand- new job, especially as a CEO, the first thing they have to do is take a pause and talk to everybody. Now is not the time for me to talk.
Now is the time for me to listen. So as I’m forging forward my first month, I’m back-to-back every day, all day, meeting with the donors, meeting with the board members, meeting with our current team. I need to understand what we do, what we’ve done beautifully, what we can do differently, what’s the pebble in our shoe. I’m listening.
I want to meet all these donors who have already invested in this magnificent space and I want to know what is going to draw them into that next investment, what’s inspiring them, what’s meaningful to them. When a donor invests in any philanthropic cause, it’s because their heart tells them it’s time to do something, and that’s the area they’re going to focus their attention on. I want to understand what drives them, and then I want to make sure that we’re able to deliver it for them. 

Q: You mentioned that you’re steeping into this position during “a transformative, transitional period.” Can you define that transformation for me?
A: Yes. So when you take a look at transformation, I find that exciting, exhilarating, and that is the draw.
This is a hospital that has been forging the path since its inception – our first digital hospital in Canada, the first command centre, the first Da Vinci robotic surgical instruments — they’re not afraid to change, they’re actually forging the path. And now they’re envisioning the next capital campaign, the next $100 million that we will invest in health care with a goal to create efficiency, to create the positive change that is needed in our health care system.
We all know that Canadian health care has the opportunity to change and evolve and become better. This hospital has the courage to forge the path. That draws me.

Q: What were the priority goals you knew right away you wanted to take on? 
A: We’re going to develop the Finch campus, and I love the concept of getting a space where our health care leaders are going to define what’s going to change and how we’re going to serve the community there.
Our communities speak 20 different languages. That’s a lot of different cultures. We have more single-parent families that are in these communities – they need our support. We have the opportunity to be there for health care’s most vulnerable, and that is the driver of why we need to invest in health care.

When you look at philanthropy, donors don’t give money because they have a money tree in the backyard – they are investing in an impact. This organization has already had a tremendous impact. Now that we’re taking it to that next level, developing the Finch site, creating our research, doing more robotic surgery, we have the opportunity to draw our donors into investing in the future of making the impact that our health care system so urgently needs.