Dr. Kimberly Townsend is President and CEO of Loretto Management Corporation in Syracuse, NY. She is an expert in the fields of healthcare management, board governance, and leadership. Dr. Townsend is also the author of leadership books Lifecircle Leadership: How Exceptional People Make Every Day Extraordinary and Lessons in Lifecircle Leadership: A Guide to Pragmatic Altruism.

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Personal Bio

Kimberly Townsend is a role model for anyone who wants to make positive change in the world. Like many, she’s juggling the demands of family and the pressures of a full-time job, while still finding time to volunteer and better the community. She’s inspired by making a sustainable difference in people’s lives and seeing her company and her community prosper.

Dr. Townsend grew up in Windham, NH, near Boston. She went to Boston University for two years before leaving school to support her family. After several years as a stay-at-home mom, she decided it was time to act on her dream of earning a law degree to help others.

Dr. Townsend went back to school in her early 30s. Her passion for learning led her to earn five degrees, including a law degree, an MBA, and a doctorate in education. She worked throughout her schooling, supporting her children, sometimes as a single mother. She has since remarried and is now a mother of six and grandmother of three, and she lives in Syracuse with her family.

Nonprofit is a huge force in Dr. Townsend’s life. She’s affiliated with many professional and civic organizations, including the New York State Workforce Investment Board, HealtheConnections, WISE, and United Way of Central New York. She got involved with the Go Red Campaign of the American Heart Association in 2012 and was Chairwoman of the campaign in 2015-2016, raising over $350,000 to fight heart disease in women.

Dr. Townsend is passionate about living a purposeful, connected life. She is driven by a deep desire to improve herself personally, her company, and her community, through her philosophy of Lifecircle Leadership and pragmatic altruism. She invites others to reconsider their approach to business and life and hopes they discover, as she did, that being and doing good is good for business.

Professional Bio

Kimberly Townsend, MBA, MPA, JD, Ed.D, CPA, GPHR, joined the board of Loretto Management Corporation in Syracuse, NY in 2011 and was named President and CEO in 2014. Before that, Dr. Townsend spent 13 years at Welch Allyn, a medical devices and software company, working her way from Attorney to Associate General Counsel to Senior Director of Government Affairs. Previous work includes positions at PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP and Ernst & Young LLP.

Dr. Townsend earned a Bachelor in Business Administration, a Masters of Business Administration, a Juris Doctorate, and an Executive Masters of Public Administration from Syracuse University and a Doctorate in Executive Leadership from St. John Fisher College in Rochester, NY. Other professional development includes Measurement, Design and Analysis Methods for Health Outcomes Research and Leadership Strategies for Evolving Healthcare Executives, both at the Harvard School of Public Health.

In addition to being an attorney admitted to the New York, New Jersey, and Washington, D.C. Bars, Dr. Townsend is a Certified Public Accountant and is SHRM-certified in Global Professional Human Resources. She was Adjunct Professor at Syracuse University from 2001-2011, and was the recipient of the 2010 President’s Award-Customer First at Welch Allyn, Inc.

Dr. Townsend is a prolific speaker and writer whose work has been published in industry journals and business publications. For more information about her books, visit the Books page. And to book Dr. Townsend as a speaker, visit the Speaking page.

Loretto Management Corporation is a non-profit, post-acute healthcare system with assets in skilled nursing, housing, managed care, short-term rehabilitation and medical adult day services. It serves 10,000 older adults throughout Central New York. It is the 4th largest health system in Central New York, with 2,500 employees at 19 sites and $200 million in revenue in 2018.

Loretto was founded in 1926 as the first Diocesan home for the aged in North America and continues to address the needs of older adults in the community, the majority of whom (70%) are Medicaid eligible. It provides skilled nursing, assisted living and affordable housing, home health, rehabilitation, PACE, and many other specialized programs.

Dr. Townsend believes that Loretto has a mission to serve both the people in the community who need Loretto’s services and the employees of the company, 65% of whom are single, women of color, and head of households living in highly impoverished neighborhoods.