Getting to Know the Executive Director of Diversity
Katherine Haynes Sanstad is the region's executive director of diversity
Katherine Haynes Sanstad is the region's executive director of diversity. Since she started in February 2006 she has had a big job: to see that her emerging department helps to identify opportunities for improving care and service for all Kaiser Permanente members.
Katherine answers our questions about her new position at Kaiser Permanente.
Describe Your Career Highlights.
My background is in arts management, advertising and marketing, public health, and health care. I've worked for the Institute for the Future, the California Health Care Foundation, and for 10 years at the UCSF Center for AIDS Prevention Studies, where our model for community collaborative research was adopted by major health organizations. I hope it led researchers to ask better, more relevant questions, and AIDS service organizations to field better programs. Over the past three years, I have worked as a health and health care strategy consultant with clients including Kaiser Permanente Sales and Account Management, The Permanente Federation, and KPSC Strategic Planning and Consulting.
Why Did You Join Kaiser Permanente?
Kaiser Permanente offered me a chance to join an industry leader in improving health and health care at the population level. The organization has done great work in diversity and culturally competent care, particularly in the areas of HR and linguistic access for members.
What intrigued me was that the region's leadership wants to ensure that the capacity to work in an increasingly diverse world is integrated into every aspect of operations. Our department will work across the organization, providing the infrastructure and tools to meet every member with genuine desire and ability to serve, and with a willingness to 'culture-switch' to provide the highest quality of care possible. Doing that, we'll remain at the vanguard of health care, and be positioned to grow.
What's Been the First Order of Business?
Improving already good language access is a huge project for us. We need reliable, timely, and easy-to-use linguistic services and translated materials. If we are going to improve health care experience and outcomes, we also need to know who our members are. So collecting sociodemographic data such as race and ethnicity for clinical use and quality improvement is another major effort we're supporting. That means building a system to get the data that is easy to deploy and produces useful information. We'll also be working with Sales and our region's areas to make sure our facilities are ready to serve emerging markets.
What Does Diversity Mean in Your Work?
Diversity is not just about race and language. It's about sexual orientation, physical ability, age, socioeconomic class, health and health care practices, and much more. Most important, in our pluralistic society, it is not about the people formerly known as minorities. It is about each and every one of us. The enterprises that are adept at working in deep and increasing diversity will be the winners in the 21st century. Kaiser Permanente must be among them.
What About You Would Surprise People?
When I was 16, I helped build a community center in the West Indies. In 1997, we won a Parenting magazine room makeover for my son's room. In my spare time, I'm the first vice president of a synagogue in Berkeley.
Name a Value You Hold Dear
True inclusiveness. To reach out to, learn from, and truly engage with people who are different from you or who see things differently than you do.