Why global health needs collective leadership | Heather Anderson and David Kamau

Heather Anderson, guest · [02:02]I'm Heather Anderson, CEO of Global Health Corps, and, in terms of origin story, like many fellows and alumni at GHC, I didn't actually start my career in public health. I was a management consultant through my twenties, but I came to realize that while I had gained useful skills and experience, as a consultant, I was far more drawn to pursuing a career in gender equity and global health, and decided given the persistent inequities that were happening around the world, I couldn't sit on the sidelines any longer. So, I decided to take what I learned in the private sector and figure out this new career path. I first packed up and drove a U-Haul truck to Chicago, from Chicago to Washington, D.C., and after dozens of informational interviews, landed a job at Planned Parenthood Global, which really launched my career for the next 20 years. Since then, I've had the opportunity to work at a number of amazing organizations, live in a number of countries, and continue on to graduate school. And it was in New York City in 2012 when I met one of GHC's co-founders and CEO, Barbara Bush. I was immediately captivated by the vision of building a network of emerging health leaders and equipping them with the skills and resources to unlock their potential and improve health outcomes. Personally, this was meaningful to me because I was inspired, because during my time working in nonprofits, I saw firsthand the lack of investment in leadership and management in public health, especially for early career health professionals. And given that I had started my career out in the private sector, where I had been afforded coaching and trainings and mentorship, I realized that this was such a missing gap, especially in the nonprofit and government sectors. So I saw this as a great opportunity to join an amazing team at Global Health Corps and help build and grow an organization dedicated to investing in the next generation of health leaders. And so my first seven years at GHC was scaling and supporting the expansion of our leadership programs in Africa and the US. And then when Barbara transitioned to the board after a decade of service in 2019, the board asked me to step in.

David Kamau, guest · [05:14]So I'm David Kamau. I'm connecting from Nairobi, Kenya, and I'm currently the chief program officer at, Global Health Corps. Now, my origin story, I think, is, is a little bit interesting because my career and, my life has been centered on youth development, even before I knew that that's the career path I would follow. So early on in my career, I served as a volunteer, working with a, with a nonprofit that, that trained leaders on how to mentor youth. and then I spent some years after that, working with a private sector company that was building capacity in children and, and young people, as young as eight years old, to, you know, early career. and, and we used to do things like, you know, life skills, emotional intelligence, goal setting, you know, things like that, really setting them up for success. after a couple of years doing that, I transitioned, into entrepreneurship with a good friend of mine, and we set up a, a company, again, focused on youth leadership development. that, over the years, though, we did, you know, several pivots. Ended up working more in the startup space with, with SMEs and more broadly in organizational development. now it's the more recent years in my career that have led me to GHC. after ten years as an entrepreneur, almost ten years, I had the privilege to be part of, of a team that established one of the, the most renowned Africa, you know, leadership programs, the Young African Leaders Initiative. and there, you know, that role allowed me to work with young people across fourteen countries in East and Central Africa. But not just that, I had the opportunity to be part of the leadership of the growing Pan-African movement that we were, that we're building, which was a network of over twenty thousand young leaders across Sub-Saharan Africa. the last part of my work with, with YALI, was in West Africa. I had the chance to, to support the initiative in, Anglophone, West Africa, so based out of Accra in Ghana. And then now here I am, you know, three months into my, the next chapter of, of, of my, of my career, which is at, at GHC. and what drew me in is just over the years with my experience of just how critical leadership and youth leadership development is, that's what attracted me to, to participate and to join GHC. and of all the sectors that really require this and why there's a huge need, the health sector is one of them. But I think in, in, in closing, one of the things that I think really important for me to mention is As I was growing up, I didn't necessarily see myself as a leader or as a leader of leaders, and it took a mentor of mine years ago when I was nineteen to, to see the potential in me and call it out. And that's why for me, you know, I actually did a lot of what I've done over the past twenty years to this one gentleman, who called out that, and, and that's why for me, leadership development is really close to my heart, because I, I can see what a mentor can do, I can see what a, a good leadership development program can do.

David Kamau, guest · [14:58]To respond to that question, I-I'd love to reflect on an experience I recently had. So I was in Malawi just a few, a few weeks ago, with our fellows for an in-person retreat. And I, I, I don't know, you know, how much you know, know about Malawi, but it's one of the countries that was hardest hit, you know, in terms of this, foreign aid cuts this year. I think it said that over forty percent of its national health budget, was slashed. Right? And so there's, there's definitely a huge need, and many opportunities to shift to a more sustainable, like, locally led approach for health. Now, specific, specifically coming to our fellows and alumni, that has meant for them, in the face of all of these changes, for them to really be adaptable, right, for them to really demonstrate that resilience, for them to, to lean into their, their community, into their network. And it has meant them stepping up beyond their job descriptions, and even starting to think collectively about how they can either fill this leadership vacuums or figure out how to navigate in this new reality that they're facing. And, and to be honest, it's, it's sometimes a little bit bleak for them. and so one of the things that, that, that I, I experienced when connecting with the fellows there is The, just the importance of that network and that community in keeping them standing, keep them moving forward. Some of the things that they did practically to adapt is one, you know, supporting each other as they seek new opportunities, supporting each other as they, as they seek to solve some of the problems that they're facing. and, and so to, to that point, the work that then we are doing as GHC is really absolutely critical for crises like those. and when you think about it, then burnout also becomes a really great challenge, that you've asked. But that trusted network of peers, you know, that's what keeps them going, even when the work can be lonely and overwhelming. And without that space to go to, to reflect and to hone their approaches, impact then can be very limited if they try to go it on their own. and so to be able to provide these spaces, shadows frameworks, the tools, the resources to connect these young people with the coaches and mentors and the peers, I think that opens up possibilities for a lot more sustainable impact. And one of the things, as we've reflected back over ten years, our impact assessment found that because of this, this different parts that, that are around our fellows and alumni to support them and to keep them going, JSC fellows stay in the sector two times, at a rate of two times more than their peers. So this is not accidental, this is by virtue of the network and the support that they receive from each other and from JSC that makes all the difference.

Heather Anderson, guest · [18:34]So admittedly, it's hard to just pick one trait. And at GHC, we refer to them as leadership practices because we talk about how leadership is a practice. It isn't something that you're going to finally achieve at one point in time, but you continue to work on. But one of the ones that I think especially have been relevant of years past and the current time is adaptability. And we've really seen this trait over and over, especially during acute crisis, whether we're talking about Ebola in 2014, the pandemic in 2020, massive foreign aid cuts this past year. And, you know, as we've been talking about, leaders have to operate in constantly shifting environments. You know, job descriptions are thrown out the window, and so being able to understand how to navigate, make decisions, figure out your way forward is really important. And, you know, to share A brief story. One of our Rwandan alumna, Christian Beninama, is an architect. So, you know, we talk about how health have leaders from all different sectors and what we need. And he's the co-executive director and principal at NAS Design Group out of Rwanda, one of our first GHC alums. And he is working to build a generation of architects who are committed to designing clinics and schools that proactively promote health and well-being in Rwanda. So I share this because I remember during the pandemic, and it is as relevant now, I remember having a conversation with him, and he called the GHC network his brain trust. And that it was really his go-to resource for the support during unprecedented times, as you were figuring out how do you navigate budgets, how do you secure PPE, how do you figure out how do you help run an organization and make decisions to be able to move forward in such difficult times. And in his words, he talks about how architecture isn't resilient because it lasts, it's resilient because it adapts. And the same can be said for leadership. And Christian's vision and leadership, you know, has really saved and improved millions of lives over the last 15 years. And so I share this to underscore the ability to be adaptive, in part really can stem from being in a trusted community. As we were just talking about, you know, we see anecdotally and otherwise that isolated leaders can burn out more quickly, they revert to rigidity, they are more likely to act out of fear than conviction. GEC leaders are held up and held accountable by their peers, so they adapt and keep going.

Heather Anderson, guest · [27:25]Yeah, I can add that in, you know, 2019, and in general, we have been very nerdy and focused about what measurement and evaluation and impact has looked like because the field of leadership development so much has been focused on an individual, and we really wanted to push the envelope about understanding what collective impact through a leadership approach looks like. And so coming out of a ten-year assessment in 2019, we created our first in-depth theory of impact. It really was a causal pathway about how our leadership approach strengthens health systems to advance health equity. And we do that from both the short-term approach of evaluating our fellowship Programs, as well as looking at the long-term impact. So if we're talking about our leadership accelerators, what are the growth in their leadership competencies? What are their contributions to organizations? Are they increasing their role? What do the supervisors think of their experience? And from a long-term, because really when we think about the ROI, and this is why we spend a third of our programmatic expenses on the alumni part of our program, because we know that the start of the fellowship is just the beginning, that it's really going to be throughout the course of their career where we can continue to see what this ripple effect looked like. You know, we've seen 16 years in that, as we're sharing, the alumni are remaining tightly connected, and that 70% of them report that they are working professionally together. As we were talking earlier, 80% of them are now in mid to senior level leadership roles. And again, the average age when these All, when they started out as fellows, were 25. And so now this is where they are ending up. They're managing entire teams, and collectively we've seen that at this point of what the network is looking like, that they are overseeing $8 billion in funding and overseeing collectively more than 11,000 staff.

Heather Anderson, guest · [34:50]Well, Daniel, I think you are for sure right that we are in uncertain times and that, the world is rapidly changing. And, you know, I'd say that there's more that we need leaders who can lead well in these conditions. So our resolve at GHC is to keep going as strong as we can. Because I, what we've seen, and we've seen this at times, you know, even historically during different times of crisis or change, that, You know, often the leadership development or the systems change thinking really fall to the back burner, and that sort of the long-term thinking is, you know, taken out in favor of what's needed in the short term. And that's a real missed opportunity. We have to continue to be intentional, focused on getting out of this cycle of being reactive. And if we want to get ahead of other crisis, which, you know, no doubt we will also face in the future, you know, investing in leadership now is one of our surest bets.