Dawn H. Johnson

With 25+ years of health care leadership, management and clinical experience, Dawn H. Johnson (she/her/hers) is recognized as a dynamic clinician and executive leader with a proven record of advancing transformational change resulting from creating, interpreting and managing health programs. Dawn has built a successful career in health policy, and advocacy in the federal, state, and private sectors. Dawn’s expertise is driving vision, executing missions, and navigating dynamic environments with a special focus on vulnerable populations, health equity and public-private partnerships. Her work focuses on building equitable and sustainable pathways for healthy communities, mentoring and supporting the next set of leaders and community champions by enhancing skills in policy, health care delivery and health equity.

As a masters-prepared registered nurse with a diverse background, Dawn has worked with multiple federal agencies, state governments, community and private associations and health ecosystem partners. Ms. Johnson’s professional experience includes more than ten years of management consulting with health systems, payers, providers and government agencies on population health, strategy development and execution, stakeholder engagement and facilitation, and interpreting health policy for market viability, operations and business development. Her background and experience in nursing allows her to apply an understanding that the health and well-being of individuals and populations are deeply rooted in their exposure to and experience in their community and the condition of their environment.

Dawn’s fourteen year federal career spans agencies that includes the Veterans Affairs and the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS). She held leadership positions in both the Medicaid and Medicare programs in the Region and at the Central Office.

Ms. Johnson earned her Masters in Nursing and Business Administration from the University of Maryland. She is a member of the Board for Planned Parenthood of Southern New England (PPSNE), the CT Chapter of the National Association of Health Service Executives (NAHSE), Gather New Haven, is Co-Chair of the Diversity and Inclusion Committee of CTAHE in addition to several other leadership and board roles in community organizations. She is married with two daughters and lives in Connecticut.