Halvorson not retiring, just 'repotting'

Kaiser Permanente's George Halvorson handed off his CEO title to Bernard Tyson on July 1 and at the end of the year will relinquish his position as chairman, too.

So what comes next? “I'm definitely not retiring,” Halvorson said. “I'm repotting.”

Halvorson, who led the influential Oakland, Calif.-based integrated system for 11 years, is expanding his reach beyond healthcare. He accepted a four-year appointment as chairman of the First 5 California Commission, a state-run entity aiming to develop community-based early childhood education programs focusing on the first five years of a child's life.

“Those years are absolutely critical,” Halvorson said. “If you do the right things in those years, they have a much a greater chance at success in life.”

Halvorson said he has taken the commission's agenda to healthcare meetings to spread the message that “mothers need to know at birth there are steps they can take to improve their child's ability to learn.”

And in January, Halvorson said, he will form an institute to work on racial prejudice and ethnic conflict and to explore what can be done to improve understanding and relationships between different groups. “I think our country is at a point where we really need that work.”

Follow Andis Robeznieks on Twitter: @MHARobeznieks