CEO Communications: 2020 Highlights

By: Thomas G. Bognanno, President & CEO CHC: Creating Healthier Communities

This year is not what any of us expected, but we still have much to be thankful for, including you — our dedicated partners, friends, board and staff. Here are a few of my 2020 highlights:

NEW BRAND

  • In September, we changed our name, relaunching the Community Health Charities brand as CHC: Creating Healthier Communities and re-committing ourselves to addressing the barriers to good health and equity.

HEALTH EQUITY

  • This fall, we completed a successful grant partnership with Anthem Foundation BlueCross BlueShield, focused on a landscape assessment and toolkit that identify gaps and accelerate collaboration to advance a community’s health equity work.
  • KPMG and CHC began working together as community health equity partners on virtual summits and promoting the launch of the National COVID-19 Resiliency Network with Morehouse School of Medicine. CHC has also been appointed to Morehouse’s Advisory Board.
  • CHC began working with the Multicultural Center of Excellence at Pfizer, discussing ways to increase diversity in clinical trials.
  • We launched our first Diversity and Inclusion training for LDI.
  • CHC launched a new Community Health Center, featuring expert advice from Children’s National Hospital, March of Dimes, Candid, Anthem and more, plus created a new board health equity committee dedicated to advancing this work.
  • Right before COVID-19, we held our last in-person Future of Health convening, hosted by our new board chair, Kevin Clayton of the Cleveland Cavaliers, with speakers from Under Armour, Cleveland Clinic, KPMG, MetroHealth, RPM International, and more.
  • CHC began work on our first #ForHealthEquity campaign planned for March 2021, our single largest day of giving yet. Over the past 5 years, CHC has raised more than $300 million through workplace giving for our nonprofit partners, and more than $1 billion to date through Combined Federal Campaign.

NEW PARTNERS

  • Caring Connection in Denver joined CHC to expand the group’s impact, bringing 40 new social service nonprofits that provide food, shelter, job skills and other basic needs for the most vulnerable in local Denver communities.
  • We also welcomed Fisher House Foundation, USO Southeast Region and 35 more new nonprofit partners to CHC in 2020.

COVID-19 SUPPORT

  • Liberty Diversified International (LDI), Medica, Ball Aerospace, and Pie Five Pizza partnered with CHC on creative ways to raise funds and awareness for mental health, COVID-19 relief and more this year.
  • The Mike & Linda Fiterman Family Foundation and LDI partnered with CHC to host three virtual PhilanthroBreaks™ focused on mental wellbeing to support frontline workers at St. Therese Senior Care Facilities throughout the Twin Cities, featuring NAMI, former KARE 11 news anchor and SAVE.
  • Sportsman’s Guide made a special gift for CHC and select partners.
  • CHC compiled and shared COVID-19 resources from our nonprofit partners and conducted proprietary nonprofit surveys, highlighting findings and needs in The Washington Post, Medium and World Magazine.

CORPORATE & NONPROFT ENGAGEMENT 

  • We hosted numerous Candid Conversations, including the Impact of Racism on Employee Engagement with the Cleveland Cavaliers, Best Buy, Marriott, Pfizer, PwC and Berkshire Bank. Watch event recordings.
  • Our Nonprofit Leadership Council, chaired by St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital, met again in-person before COVID-19 and continued virtually to advance nonprofit interests in workplace giving and fundraising.
  • VoteAmerica partnered with CHC to promote nonpartisan civic engagement, including our “Voter Engagement for a Healthier Community” event with Patagonia and Kimberly-Clark.

NEW TECH & MORE

  • CHC partnered with Cheerful on a new technology platform plus launched creative new products including PhilanthroBreaks™, PhilanthroCations™ and Interest Makes Change™. Plus, Hilti made a generous gift for future PhilanthroBreaks in several markets.
  • American Express, Bayer, Johnson & Johnson, Marriott, Microsoft, WGL and more contributed new expert insights for our CSR Center.
  • CHC secured more than 780 media stories, including my thought leadership pieces in Forbes, Medium and Thrive Global.
  • CHC’s monthly virtual presentations, “The Exchange,” provided key insights for partners on topics such as the CARES Act, equity and inclusion, marketing, nonprofit growth and CSR/ESG.
  • We ran another year of highly customized targeted marketing to raise funds for our nonprofit partners through Combined Federal Campaign, state campaigns, and private sector company workplace giving campaigns.

All this tremendous progress would not be possible without our dedicated national board of directors and our talented staff team. Thanks to sound fiscal management and efficiencies, we retained all our staff in 2020 and look forward to a bright 2021. As we come to the end of this year, I could not be more thankful.

Wishing you peace and health this holiday season and looking forward to continuing to create healthier communities, together, in the coming year.

Thomas G. Bognanno, President & CEO, CHC: Creating Healthier Communities

Thomas G. Bognanno has been the President and CEO of Community Health Charities since January 2006. Prior to that, Tom had a distinguished 20-year career with the American Diabetes Association (ADA), where he served as the Chief Field Officer. He was instrumental in revitalizing ADA’s community-level infrastructure and acting as one of the chief architects of the Everyday Choices for a Healthier Life partnership between ADA, the American Heart Association, and the American Cancer Society. Before ADA, Tom spent six years with the American Cancer Society.

At Community Health Charities, Tom has been a catalyst for consolidating the organization and creating a new direction for its more than 2,000 charity partners nationwide and its network of over 17 million caring employees. Under Tom’s leadership, Community Health Charities evolved its mission to empower people to take action to improve health and wellbeing to build stronger, healthier communities. Community Health Charities supports education, treatment, and prevention for those with health challenges; brings organizations together to improve community health; provides individuals with opportunities to get involved; and increases the capacity of nonprofit organizations.

Residing in northern Virginia, Tom and his wife Suzan have been married for over 35 years and have raised three children.