Giving Compass' Take:

• ReThink Health discusses the health sector in philanthropy and argues that enacting sustainable change may mean starting uncomfortable conversations.

• While targeted toward healthcare stakeholders, the advice here can apply to a wide variety of funding efforts, where caution and marginal improvements is prioritized over bold action (to the detriment of those who need the most help).

• Here's how to make an impact on health through public policy advocacy.


Dodging discomfort is a common challenge facing regional multisector partnerships working to improve the well-being of residents, especially those with a wide and diverse set of members.

While a partnership’s members may have distinct institutional objectives, priorities, and values, they are coming together with a shared goal to transform the health of their community. Working together to advance health will inevitably require trade-offs between the participating institutions. So, to make real progress they need to master the art of healthy confrontation. They must be able to have difficult conversations, address complex issues, and resolve internal conflicts, all while effectively sustaining collaboration.

What can leaders of these partnerships do to ensure their members are adequately prepared to embrace, rather than dodge, discomfort in the name of progress? Here are a few suggestions.

Ensure your members have opportunities to get to know the others around the table at a personal level. Opening meetings on a personal note sets the stage for respectful dialogue, and encourages participants to have new conversations around the edges of your meetings.

Set an expectation that all partners communicate about their interests, values, and business models — and then ensure you have the group norms and processes established to continually enable this level of sharing and openness. Each member of the partnership will have their own priorities and interests, and these will not always overlap or harmonize perfectly. But if competing interests are identified and named, and if the members expect that they are to be open to discussion and engage in candid conversation about what’s at stake, they are better positioned to identify systemic solutions to move a transformation agenda forward.

Name the elephants in the room. A potential issue may be clear as day to one member, while another sees a completely different picture. Have a group practice of naming — out loud — when it feels like a sticky issue isn’t being expressed or addressed.

"Going along to get along" is not the right strategy for health transformation. Progress is going to take work; it’s going to require hard conversations and confrontation. But in the end, if we commit to the hard work, if we try not to dodge the discomfort, we will be able to make a real leap forward in transforming health — not just around the margins but in dramatic and measurable ways.

Read the full article on achieving good health outcomes with more direct talk by Matt Guy and Jane Erickson at ReThink Health.