The position of CEO of the Washington Health Benefit Exchange is not the easiest job.
The organization’s website, Healthplanfinder, had some technical issues in its first and second years, involving unexpectedly cancelled accounts and glitches. Now, there are many changes ahead. The exchange is transitioning from being funded by federal grants to being funded by the state Legislature.
Leadership at the exchange has also changed in the last month. Richard Onizuka, the CEO of the exchange since its 2012 founding, stepped down. The quasi-governmental agency also got a new chief financial officer.
The new interim CEO, Pam MacEwan, took over at the end of August. She said part of her role is going to involve improving the perception of the exchange.
“We’re reaching out to stakeholders to rebuild trust,” she said. “The Legislature (and others) have a lot of questions about how much does it cost to support the exchange, et cetera, and I just don’t feel like the relationship is as strong as it should be and that they understood our operations as well as we’d like them too. We’ll have an opportunity to educate them.”
In December, the Office of the Insurance Commissioner sent a letter to Onizuka asking for answers to 11 questions about how issues with Healthplanfinder were impacting users and the exchange itself.
Rebuilding trust isn’t the only thing MacEwan will focus on. She said another big challenge will be keeping up-to-date with IT improvements to the website.
“I think some of the most exciting things we can do are on our Healthplanfinder framework,” she said. “We’re looking at changes to that.”
MacEwan is also interested in becoming the exchange’s full-time CEO.
“I’m not thinking about whether there’s ‘interim’ in the title,” she said.
Even for the issues it’s had, though, the exchange still fares well compared to many others across the country. The entity is currently looking at ways to improve its customer service.
Date: September 18, 2015