As June transitions into July, Lori Marshall, president and CEO of the Chatham-Kent Health Alliance (CKHA), transitions into retirement.
For the past seven years, Marshall has helmed the alliance, navigating it out of the rocky shoals of provincially supervised reorganization and through the gale that was the COVID-19 pandemic.
Strange results for a person who at one time just wanted to be a director of pharmacy at a hospital.
Marshall grew up in Burlington and initially went into post-secondary education to become a pharmacist. She gravitated towards hospital pharmaceutical care and returned to school to obtain her Masters in Health Administration, with a goal to become the director of pharmacy at a hospital.
That never materialized. Instead, she ultimately jumped that position.
With no such openings present when she finished her schooling, she took the advice of a mentor who advised her to spread her wings.
“He said, ‘Don’t come back right now (to pharmacy). Go and do something different,’” she said.
Marshall ended up at Oshawa General Hospital in an administrative position supporting the chief of staff. It was at that time she realized her calling went beyond pharmacy.
Within a year, Marshall was one of the hospital’s vice-presidents. Soon after that, she was looking for additional growth.
That quest took her and her family to Thunder Bay, where she served as vice-president of the hospital there, as well as CEO of Nipigon Hospital nearby.
“That whet my appetite. I realized what I really wanted was a CEO role,” she said.
But the Marshalls remained in Thunder Bay for 14 years, raising their family. However, the desire to advance never left her. Plus she and her husband wanted to return to southern Ontario and be closer to their families.
When the CEO position came up at the Erie St. Clair Community Care Access Centre, she jumped at it, and the family moved here.
She spent three years there before applying for the CKHA’s top administrative position.
However, she arrived in the wake of turmoil and dysfunction as provincially appointed supervisor Rob Devitt was rebuilding things after years of problems at the alliance.
Marshall helped bring morale back up among staff.
“I came into the organization and I think everyone just wanted to get back to a place where they could be proud and say they worked at CKHA,” she said.
Marshall helped usher in transparency to the public and restore staff morale.
And then the pandemic hit.
“Those three years in Covid felt really long, and yet I also feel I blinked and they were gone,” she said. “I can remember looking at day timers in that period and there was nothing in them because it was just all hands on deck dealing with what was the crisis of the day.”
For most people, coming out of the pandemic meant a return to normal, or near normal. That was not the case in health care.
“Going back to normal for us meant dealing with huge backlogs. Our work never stopped or slowed down. In fact, it accelerated,” she said. “Health care is really still recovering from the pandemic.”
Having guided the Good Ship CKHA out of the pandemic waters, Marshall decided it was time to let someone else take the helm.
She said stepping away will leave a void in her life.
“I will miss the people. Not only the people I work with – in terms of staff, physicians and volunteers – but it’s also the conversations I have with patients and family members about the care and service in what we deliver and also what we need. I’ll miss those conversations.”
Deb Crawford, chair of the hospital board, said Marshall will be missed.
“Her leadership supported the staff, physicians and volunteers to navigate uncharted territory and the Board is very grateful for her dedication to healthcare. We are going to miss her and also wish her very well on this next chapter,” she said. “She has always kept the patient at the forefront of her decisions.”
Despite her ties to the GTA and her love of life in Thunder Bay, Marshall said what Chatham-Kent has to offer will keep her and her husband here.
“We love Chatham-Kent. Everything that we need and enjoy is here in this community,” she said. “It has proximity to places we want to go. It’s easy to go and visit our family. You can’t beat the weather.”
Marshall doesn’t plan on just fading into the background.
“I look forward in my retirement to giving back to this community,” she said.
But first, a break.
“I’m going to take the summer off and really enjoy the summer. And the pool, the backyard and everything that Chatham-Kent has to offer,” she said.
A trip to Ireland and Iceland is in the works for the fall as well. Following that, Marshall said she hopes to go into coaching and consulting.
Aaron Ryan, vice-president of performance and CFO for CKHA, will cover Marshall’s duties until a replacement is found.
