Crain's 40 Under Forty: Jacqueline (Gennie) Snow
Nov 1, 2021
Group Chief Strategy Officer | Detroit Medical Center, Chief Strategy Officer | DMC Harper University Hospital, DMC Hutzel Women’s Hospital, DMC Detroit Receiving Hospital
Career trajectory: Jacqueline (Gennie) Snow graduated with a master’s in health policy and management from Harvard University and quickly shot up the ranks at Chicago health care advisory firm The Chartis Group, eventually advising health care executives on strategy and implementation as an engagement manager. In 2018, she was hired by Detroit Medical Center as its chief strategy officer and promoted in 2020 to its group chief strategy officer, leading the system’s implementation of initiatives.
Proudest achievement: “The pandemic posed threats to everyone in the industry right out of the gate. DMC is not immune. Early on when we were trying to learn how to fly the plane in the air, when the clinicians and operators were on the front lines, I served in the command center to develop processes and protocols to treat that surge while simultaneously trying to minimize impact to care for non-COVID patients. I was working with our CEO and our corporate leadership on how we were going to prioritize surgeries across the board while balancing the needs for our staff who needed to be on the front lines. Once the protocol was developed, I rolled that out. During the second wave, as the economic fallout remained acute, I led the development of the DMC’s annual strategic plan to set priorities for the year ahead. I worked through the uncertainty and formulated a plan that prioritized key service lines and adopted tactics to facilitate the DMC’s swift return to pre-2020 patient volumes.”
What’s next: “My current plan is accelerate the momentum DMC has right now,” Snow said. “We have prioritized a lot of high acuity service lines for all of the primary services of our hospital. I am assessing the core of all these priorities and how we are engaging the community and encouraging patients to come back for treatment. Frankly, a lot of patients are still not returning for the care they need and my goal is to help our team reach them.”
Surprising fact: “If I weren’t in health care, I would have gone to culinary school to be a chef. I wish restaurant hours are different. So instead I am an enthusiastic home cook and often cook to destress. My best meal is my lamb stew. Ask my colleagues.”
