Eric Dickson, UMass Memorial CEO and president
Updated: March 30, 2020
Focus on Health Care
New fundraising effort may fix UMass Memorial’s financials
Photo | Courtesy | UMass Memorial Health Care
Kathleen Driscoll, UMass Memorial Health Care chief philanthropy officer
By Jennifer L. Grybowski
In fiscal 2019, Worcester nonprofit conglomerate UMass Memorial Health Care narrowed its annual operating losses from $28 million to $10 million, although that only came after the system sold its pharmacy management unit for $263 million to lessen its overall losses..
In order to get UMass Memorial back in the black for the first time since fiscal 2017, the system’s leadership is pushing toward a new, focused effort on community fundraising, hiring Kathleen Driscoll away from the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Boston to be its new chief philanthropy officer.
Driscoll will officially begin April 6, but said she has already been involved in some discussions with her new employer, which is the largest employer in Central Massachusetts with 11,000 workers.
“It’s an interesting time to be getting started,” she said. “We are learning what the strengths and weaknesses are in the system now.”
Eric Dickson, UMass Memorial president and CEO, said the coronavirus crisis is putting things into perspective.
“It’s really hard to not look at what’s going on today, the challenges the caregivers are going through right now,” Dickson said. “We are often feeling like we don’t have the support of the community around us compared to other institutions.”
Dickson said while UMass is grateful for the few million dollars in donations it garners each year, they don’t even compare to hospitals in Boston, who tend to generate tens of millions of dollars in philanthropy every year.
“We’re kind of living on the edge with our financials,” he said. “We were on our third year of operating loss before the coronavirus crisis. We have an obligation to serve the poor and underserved and an obligation to support the medical school.”
[Editor's Note: Eric Dickson conducted this interview before the coronavirus pandemic started hitting Central Massachusetts hard, and he was referring to the level of annual fundraising donations. In light of the community response to help with UMass Memorial's many needs during its efforts to fight the coronavirus, Dickson wanted to add, "However, given the outpouring of support we have experienced over the past few weeks it is obvious the people in our community value our healthcare organization and the role it plays in the community.”]
Focused on fundraising
UMass Medical Center merged with Memorial Hospital 23 years ago and since then, other community hospitals in Marlborough, Clinton and Leominster have joined up to create a large conglomerate of hospitals and physician groups all with a single mission to improve the health of a diverse population. However, Dickson said with that original merger, philanthropy essentially began to fall apart.
“People have the sense we are a part of the state, and we get state funding,” he said. “The opposite is true; we fund the medical school. We’ve never really had a high community support relative to like-size organizations.”
That’s why UMass Memorial decided to launch a new fundraising arm earlier this year and hire Driscoll to lead that initiative.
Driscoll “is an amazing woman who has a very impressive background, not just in philanthropy, but in marketing and customer relationships,” Dickson said. “We brought her in because we need someone to help people understand just how vital UMMHC is. There are few regions in the country where there is just one central hospital and employer that is critical to the region.”
Driscoll started out as a special education teacher, then moved to the corporate world working in advertising, marketing and corporate communications. Most recently, she worked as the secretary for institutional advancement at the Archdiocese of Boston.
Driscoll raised $400 million during her time at the Archdiocese, was a member of the Cardinal’s Cabinet and Steering Committee and led its first campaign in 17 years, started a new shared service development model, Boston Catholic Development Services, (BCDS) which annually raises over $23 million, and led the Campaign for Catholic Schools, which has raised more than $100 million for the benefit of Catholic education in the Archdiocese of Boston.
Driscoll pointed out that in all of her corporate roles, part of the job was to take on volunteer work, and she was happy to do it.
“I’ve always been a mission driven person,” she said. “It was a really awesome opportunity to use my business skills for a non-profit purpose.”
She feels education and health care are the most important organizations for any community today, so she has been drawn to those areas. In fact, she said her biggest passion has always been in children.
“I really believe in helping children and families enormously,” she said. “I’ve really seen how families are struggling, and I think children suffer the most in some ways. If you surround them with quality services, it helps everyone.”
She comes from a large family, and she and her husband Kevin have six children of their own and they volunteer regularly.
The new UMass Memorial community efforts
Driscoll’s vision for her position at UMass Memorial is to build a Class A philanthropic organization.
“You have to build it slowly; be prudent, but do it well,” she said. “One of the most exciting parts of this role is the chance to build the organization from the ground up. I like to build; I’ve done it twice. It’s galvanizing.”
Dickson said Driscoll’s No. 1 priority is not to generate more dollars, but to help connect with community and educate the community about who UMMHC is.
“I can’t imagine, given the task ahead, having a better person for this role,” Dickson said. “You can feel it when she walks in the room. She came here because she believes in the mission. She did an amazing job for the Archdiocese. I know we have a winner in [her].”
Driscoll said she will begin by looking at some ways to make changes structurally and build up infrastructure through discovery.
“We really need to chart a way that unites more people to participate in our mission and advance the message and the work we do,” she said. “I’ll be drawing on my communications and marketing skills; if you can't tell the story as to why your organization is important, you can't really raise money. That is a huge focus for the ability to be successful in fundraising.”
She will meet and talk with hospital constituents, staff, and donors, dig deep into priorities and goals, and listen to those currently engaged to find out why they are engaged and what they are doing.
“They have a small but mighty team, and I will be leveraging what they already have,” she said. “I’m really excited to be getting started, and I'm looking forward to getting to know the Worcester community.”
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