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Chris Dattaro – Chief Operating Officer

Chris Dattaro, Chief Operating Officer, Aspen RxHealth

Briefly describe the professional journey that led you to Aspen RxHealth.
After graduating from the Naval Academy I served for five years on active duty in the Navy and separated from service as a Lieutenant. Growing up I always had an interest in business and finance so after my service obligation ended I turned to Wall Street and interned at Goldman Sachs followed by a stop at FBR Capital Markets. Both Goldman and FBR were great places for me to learn about capital markets but I found I was more interested in learning how companies were built rather than in what I was working on so in the Fall of 2015 I made the jump over to Lyft as the second full-time hire in DC. During my nearly six years at Lyft, I held a variety of roles including most recently as the Regional General Manager for Lyft’s Transit, Bikes, & Scooters business but I got started running driver and marketplace operations for the rideshare business in the Mid-Atlantic region. In that capacity, I focused primarily on marketplace balance operations, product and program launches, and building a strong operations team to help scale Lyft’s growth in the region. Aspen RxHealth’s commitment to serving its pharmacists and empowering them to improve both their lives and their communities really resonated with me and reminded me of the culture at Lyft, and the challenge of building a new multi-sided marketplace is one I’m excited to work on.

Which famous quote would you pick to describe your personal business philosophy? “Success usually comes to those who are too busy to be looking for it.” – Henry David Thoreau

“Be willing to get uncomfortable. Be comfortable being uncomfortable. It may get tough, but it’s a small price to pay for living a dream. – Peter McManus

What is your MBTI personality type? How does this information connect with your career experience and leadership style?
My personality type is ENFP. “Campaigners” by nature are independent, curious, perceptive, and place a lot of value on meaningful interpersonal relationships. Going back to when I was a kid and continuing through today I’ve generally always questioned everything and wanted to know the how and the why behind all aspects of life which I think is reflected in how I approach problems and opportunities. My curiosity has sparked interest in a variety of different topics and has led me to opportunities in multiple different industries: the military, finance, transportation, and now healthcare. I really value the relationships I have with the people I work with and I spend a lot of time trying to put the pieces of the puzzle together in terms of complementing strengths and weaknesses when building a team. I’ve also always been most satisfied at work in environments that align with my core values and in environments that challenge me and allow me to constantly learn new things and build upon existing skills.

 

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Jenn Cohen – Senior Vice President, Marketing & Communications

Jenn Cohen Senior Vice President Marketing & Communications Aspen RxHealth
Jenn Cohen Senior Vice President Marketing & Communications Aspen RxHealth

Briefly describe the professional journey that led you to Aspen RxHealth. Throughout my career, I’ve had the opportunity to lead marketing, communications and PR efforts for technology companies large and small, taking start-ups through funding rounds, larger companies post-IPO, and managed the communication complexities through countless mergers and a handful of acquisitions. I’ve worked with payers and providers, patients and health systems, and find no other industry as energizing and humbling as healthcare technology. Each day I am motivated knowing that the work my team and I accomplish is positively impacting people’s lives. Once I met the team at Aspen RxHealth, I knew this was home. What we are doing to revolutionize the pharmacy industry is truly remarkable and what excites me most is that we’ve only just begun.

Which famous quote would you pick to describe your personal business philosophy? “Don’t let what you don’t know scare you, because it can become your greatest asset. And if you do things without knowing how they have always been done, you’re guaranteed to do them differently.” – Sara Blakely

Who is the most interesting person you have had the opportunity to work with and why? I began my career as a speechwriter for General Norman Schwarzkopf and General Alexander Haig. Many family members of mine served under General Schwarzkopf and never in my wildest dreams did I think I’d be serving as speechwriter for two of our nation’s most notable figures. Working for such respected, iconic leaders at such a ripe age taught me the value of humility and unwavering tenacity.

What three words best describe your leadership style? Engaged. Pragmatic. Transparent.

 

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Clayton Walberg – Chief Commercial Officer

Clayton Walberg, Chief Commercial Officer, Aspen RxHealth

Briefly describe the professional journey that led you to Aspen RxHealth.
Business innovation is a proven attractant for me. I’ve always leaned in heavily to new models that seek to maximize technology or innovate business practices. Graduating business school at the peak of the Internet bubble, I immediately sought to join a technology start-up and haven’t looked back. In my early twenties, I founded a cloud-based HR/Benefits technology service, Eesis, then joined an entrepreneurial pharmacy robotics company purchased by McKesson and most recently co-founded TAVHealth, a successful technology as a service focused on the burgeoning social determinants of the health market. This culmination of work experience led me to Aspen RxHealth. Alignment with my experience has been near perfect, but more importantly, Aspen has delivered on the three constants I seek in any endeavor. Market-changing innovation, outstanding culture and the ability to impact people’s lives for the better.

Which famous quote would you pick to describe your personal business philosophy?
“Success is not final; failure is not fatal: it is the courage to continue that counts.”
–Winston Churchill

Reflecting on your greatest accomplishment and your greatest setback, which do you think you learned more from and why?
That’s easy. Having spent my career in entrepreneurial endeavors, failure is inevitable. Those failures and what you learn from them define your success.

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Wuhong Li – Chief Technology Officer

Wuhong Li, Chief Technology Officer, Aspen RxHealth

Briefly describe the professional journey that led you to Aspen RxHealth.
Right after graduation from UF, I joined Gold Standard, an off-campus startup company, to work on a drug reference product called Clinical Pharmacology (CP). For the next 12 years, I lived and breathed CP, taking it from its inception as a Mac/Windows desktop product to become the first-to-market database-driven mobile application in the drug information space. I oversaw the transformation of CP from a standalone application to a clinical decision support (CDS) integration platform and fostered Gold Standard’s technology team as one of the finest innovators in Healthcare IT. In 2003, working with Florida Medicaid, I led the development of eMPOWERx, a point-of-care application with integrated medication claims history data, CDS engine and ePrescribing on PocketPC, the mobile platform at the time. It was recognized as the Enabling Technology Award winner at HIMSS 2005 and later deployed as the platform for KatrinaHealth.org, an online medication record access system implemented in an ONC-coordinated rapid response to Hurricane Katrina.

Gold Standard was acquired by Elsevier, and I served as SVP for Application Development to led R&D in its CDS platform and mobile application development. In 2009, I joined Avatar Solutions as its VP of Technology and led the technology transformation of its Targeted Survey system. Targeted Survey delivers personalized patient satisfaction survey, employee engagement survey and data analytic services to some of the nation’s premier healthcare systems, hundreds of hospitals and physician groups including Kaiser Permanente, Mayo Clinics and Dignity Health.

Most recently, I was CTO and co-founder of VUCA Health. Leveraging video, mobile, cloud technologies and expert experience in drug information systems, VUCA Health creates the world’s largest library of medication education videos providing patients with a digital engagement experience.

What three words best describe your leadership style?
Vision, Integrity, Excellence.

What is the one career accomplishment of which you are most proud, thus far?
Clinical Pharmacology, the flagship drug information database from Gold Standard. I was fortunate to have the opportunity to work with a passionate and talented team, from its early design to overseeing its growth to become the premier clinical decision support (CDS) system for thousands of hospitals, retail pharmacies and academic institutions throughout the US.

What fictional world or place would you like to visit?
Downton Abbey

What was your favorite subject in high school and why?
Chinese Literature. I was in China at the time, learning and reading a lot of classical Chinese books, in some ways, as an escape from math and all the science.

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Leah Carden – Chief Financial Officer

Leah Carden, Chief Financial Officer, Aspen RxHealth

Which famous quote would you pick to describe your personal business philosophy?
People are your most valuable asset. Only people can be made to appreciate in value.

What three words best describe your leadership style?
Engaged. Committed. Honest.

What is a typical workday like for you?
My typical workday, whether it’s working for a small or large company, revolves around supporting and growing the business. I believe leaders are responsible for culture. I’m a very hands-on leader and like to add value by understanding all aspects of the business, not just the financials. I save the reporting and less interactive items for later in the day and try to maximize my time with the people in the organization.

What was your favorite subject in high school and why?
Any math class… I love that you can solve a problem and have an answer that is right or wrong.

 

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Kim Russo – Senior Vice President, Pharmacy Services

Kim Russo, Senior Vice President, Pharmacy Services, Aspen RxHealth

Briefly describe the professional journey that led you to Aspen RxHealth.
After I graduated, I was fortunate to land a position at a large community hospital pharmacy that had a close-knit team of pharmacists, each with their own strengths and skill sets. I’m grateful for all they taught me and for their support in helping me reach my final position there as a board-certified clinical pharmacy manager. After 13 years, I transitioned to join my current colleagues at VUCA Health and now at Aspen RxHealth, where I strive to apply my clinical knowledge and patient care beliefs into my work.

Which famous quote would you pick to describe your personal business philosophy?
I don’t know how famous it is, but for start-ups in particular, I believe in Katia Beauchamp’s, “There is no one right answer, there is strategy, execution and iteration.” Starting a company can be scary if you leave your comfort zone as an expert and enter a new role as a beginner. In fact, sometimes the hardest part is just getting started! You can gain a lot of confidence by choosing to focus on objective steps instead of irrational fears of failure. And those steps are to make the best choices you can at the time, implement them and then make changes as needed to reach your ultimate vision. Continuous quality improvement all the way!

 

Who is the most interesting person you have had the opportunity to work with and why?
I’ve worked with many interesting people, but the most interesting to me is Wuhong Li. I’ve worked with him now for seven years, and I’m convinced he can do anything and with a smile too! He has such an admirable balance of so many areas of his life — from Western and Eastern cultures, art and astrophysics and computer programming to spoken languages. I’m proud to call him a colleague and friend, and I always enjoy learning from him.

How will your unique set of skills, knowledge and professional experience help propel Aspen in the right direction?
My experience as a clinical hospital pharmacist taught me that I could always trust my decisions if they included putting the needs of patients first, and I carry that with me at Aspen.

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David Medvedeff – Chief Executive Officer

David Medvedeff, Chief Executive Officer, Aspen RxHealth

Briefly describe the professional journey that led you to Aspen RxHealth.
I feel like I should be sitting on a park bench in Savannah eating a box of chocolates as I tell my story. (Forrest Gump reference in case you missed it.) Seriously, I started my career with the Eckerd Corporation managing a team of pharmacists focused exclusively on delivering medication therapy management services in a retail pharmacy setting (this was long before Medicare adopted a similar model). I had my first exposure in working with a technology team when I joined Gold Standard (now Elsevier) and quickly became fascinated by the combination of healthcare (specifically decision support) and technology. Fast forward 15 years from that first exposure and I find myself working with the same team of brilliant people iteratively solving problems related to patient experience and health literacy.

Which famous quote would you pick to describe your personal business philosophy?
“Culture eats strategy for breakfast.” – Peter Drucker.

Reflecting on your greatest accomplishment and your greatest setback, which do you think you learned more from and why?
Without a doubt my greatest setback. I am a firm believer that accomplishments validate something you already know while setbacks teach the hard
lessons.

Have you received any notable awards or honors and/or had any of your work published?
It has been my privilege to work with and for some remarkable people. As a result of these amazing teams and mentors, I have been fortunate enough to be recognized by my peers on several occasions. Specifically, I have received the Prescott Leadership Award, a two-time recipient of the APhA Foundation Pinnacle Award, Next Generation Pharmacist Technology Innovator, the University of Florida College of Pharmacy Outstanding Alumnus Award and the Service Excellence Award.

Based on your experience in the pharmacy industry, why do you believe Aspen can make a big difference in this industry?
Quite simply because it is the right solution at the right time. There has been little to no real innovation in supporting the pharmacist-patient relationship and the industry is ripe for disruption.