There has been no shortage of headlines about Community Health Systems in the past year. Who are the men and woman sitting on the corporate board who have influenced CHS' strategy, restructuring, divestments, executive compensation and layoffs?
Here is a closer look at the governance team for this Fortune 500 company. Board members are presented in alphabetical order after Mr. Smith.
1. Wayne Smith, president and CEO of CHS since 1997, has served as chairman of the board since 2001. Before CHS, Mr. Smith spent 23 years with Humana, ending up as president and COO of the company. Mr. Smith also serves as chair of the Federation of American Hospitals, which represents more than 1,000 investor-owned or managed hospitals and health systems. He holds bachelor's and master's degrees from Auburn (Ala.) University — where he also serves on the board — and a master's degree in healthcare administration from Trinity University in San Antonio.
2. John Clerico is co-founder and chairman of ChartMark Investments, a Tulsa, Okla.-based investment advisory firm he established with his nephew in 2000. He has served on CHS' board since 2003 and currently chairs the compensation committee. Mr. Clerico has also spent 14 years guiding the board's Audit and Compliance Committee, of which he is still a member.
3. Michael Dinkins is president and CEO of McKinney, Texas-based Dinkins LLC, which helps small businesses gain access to capital. He has held this role since 2017. Before then, he served as CFO for several public and private companies, including Integer Holdings, a medical device outsource manufacturer, and USI Insurance Services. Mr. Dinkins earned his bachelor's in finance and CPA and CMA certifications from East Lansing-based Michigan State University. He joined the CHS board in 2017.
4. James Ely III is founder and CEO of PriCap Advisors, an investment advisory firm. He previously worked as a senior banking and managing director with JPMorgan, where he structured and arranged syndicated loans. Mr. Ely earned his MBA from the University of Chicago. He has served on CHS' board since 2009 and chairs the audit and compliance committee.
5. John Fry is president of Drexel University in Philadelphia and past president of Franklin & Marshall College in Lancaster, Pa. His familiarity with governance issues faced by nonprofit organizations helps the board understand the environment in which many of CHS' competitors and acquisition targets operate, according to CHS' website. A native of Brooklyn, N.Y., Mr. Fry graduated from Lafayette College in Easton, Pa., and earned a master's degree in business administration from New York University.
6. Tim Hingtgen, president and COO of CHS, joined the system's board in 2017. He began his tenure with CHS in 2008 as vice president of operations after holding COO or CEO roles at hospitals affiliated with other for-profit operators. Mr. Hingtgen holds a bachelor's degree in business administration from the University of Iowa in Iowa City and a master's degree in business administration from the University of Nevada-Las Vegas.
7. William Norris Jennings, MD, brings the physician perspective to the board. He is a retired physician who practiced family medicine for more than 43 years, most recently with KentuckyOne Health in Louisville. He joined CHS' board in 2008.
8. K. Ranga Krishnan, MB, ChB, brings the physician leader perspective to the board. He is dean of Rush Medical College and senior vice president of Rush University Medical Center in Chicago. He previously served as dean of Duke-NUS Medical School, a joint venture between Duke University in Durham, N.C., and the National University of Singapore. Dr. Krishnan joined the board in 2017, and CHS' website says he aids the board in understanding the management of physician practices and maintaining compliance with the complex regulatory requirements. A native of Madras, India, Dr. Krishnan received his medical degree from Madras Medical College in 1978.
9. Julia North has one of the longest tenures on CHS' board, serving since 2004. Now retired, Ms. North previously held several senior executive positions, including those with telecommunication companies like BellSouth Telecommunications and VSI Enterprises in the 1990s. CHS says the breadth of industries in which she has worked "provides risk assessment perspectives that are different from our operations." Ms. North serves as lead director of the board, a member of the compensation committee and chair of the governance and nominating committee.
10. H. James Williams, PhD, has served as president of MountSt. JosephUniversity in Cincinnati since 2016. At the time of his appointment to the CHS board in 2015, he was president of FiskUniversity, a liberal arts school in Nashville, Tenn., known for its historic role in the education of African-American students. Dr. Williams has held faculty positions at business schools, served on boards of several nonprofit organizations and hospitals, practiced law, and worked in the audit division of Ernst & Young. He earned his bachelor's from Durham-based North CarolinaCentralUniversity, MBA in accounting from the University of Wisconsin-Madison, PhD in accounting from Athens-based University of Georgia, and JD and LLM degrees from GeorgetownUniversity in Washington, D.C.