Looking back on her dozen years at the Business Group, Darling said she is most proud of increasing total membership to its current level of 377 members, nearly triple in size from its level of 129 members when she started. Members of the Business Group are mostly Fortune 500 companies and large public-sector employers that provide health coverage for more than 50 million U.S. workers, retirees and their families.
Modern Healthcare named Darling as one of the 100 Most Influential People in Healthcare in 2011, 2012 and 2013 and one of the Top 25 Women in Healthcare in 2011 and 2013.
Before joining the Business Group, Darling served as practice leader at Watson Wyatt Worldwide, and also had directed the purchasing of health benefits and disability at Xerox Corp. for 55,000 U.S. employees plus their dependents and retirees. Her earlier experience included a stint as an adviser to Sen. David Durenberger (R-Minn.), who was the ranking member on the Senate Finance Committee's Health Subcommittee.
In an interview with Modern Healthcare, Darling also said she is proud that the Business Group has emphasized evidence-based research to determine what employers will pay for in their benefit programs.
“When we pushed for that 12 years ago, that was relatively new thinking,” Darling said. The National Institutes of Health understood the concept, she said, but it was a different mindset for employers to say they should not pay for services that were not evidence-based for individuals.
In Marcotte, Darling said the NGBH will have a leader who not only brings decades of experience in health policy and health benefits, but also a visionary who “understands where the world ought to be, not just where it is.”
And that will help him navigate what she believes will be his greatest challenge as president and CEO of the NBGH, which, as she put it, will be to “skate to where the puck will be.”
“What the organization needs to be is evolving now, and will have to continue to evolve,” Darling said. “To be successful in this job, you have to anticipate what it will be in the future.”
Follow Jessica Zigmond on Twitter: @MHjzigmond
