Business Women Awards 025
INDUSTRY LEADER HEALTH CARE:
Dayna Gladstein, Newport Mental Health CEO and president
EVEN THOUGH SHE has spent close to four decades in the health care field, Dayna Gladstein does not think of herself as an expert. Rather, Gladstein, Newport Mental Health’s CEO and president, considers herself as someone who brings the experts together to improve the health of others.
“I think the client and the family that we serve [are] expert about themselves,” Gladstein said.
But Gladstein, an independent clinical social worker licensed in Rhode Island and Massachusetts, doesn’t shy away from challenges. Her portfolio speaks to that.
Before joining the Middletown-based mental health care nonprofit five years ago, first as chief operating officer and then working her way up to be its top executive, Gladstein served in an array of roles, both in nonprofit administration and as a social worker.
As an administrator, she was the vice president of emergency services for Pine Street Inn in Boston, where she worked on developing shelters and in rapid re-housing, triage and emergency services. As vice president of community services at Child & Family Services in Providence, she directed behavioral health, medical and foster care programs.
Gladstein’s time working directly with communities as a social worker helped inform her leadership philosophy. She recalls working at St. Joseph’s Hospital in Providence in the 1980s, where she was involved in developing the state’s first perinatal addiction program.
That experience, she says, showed her changes can be made to improve underserved populations.
“It’s not easy. You have to be patient and you have to keep at it,” Gladstein said, “but that’s really what has always given me inspiration that it can be done again because I saw it happen in real life and as a very young social worker.
Since joining Newport Mental Health, Gladstein’s vision and experience have been an asset to the organization and, in turn, the community the organization serves. She oversaw Newport Mental Health becoming Rhode Island’s first federally funded Certified Community Behavioral Health Clinic. It is a designation that underscores the organization’s – and Gladstein’s – commitment to improving the standards of care and access to care for those seeking mental health services.
“My goal is to make sure we have the best possible services for our children and families and schools, our adolescents, so that we can try to get in front of serious substance use disorders and serious mental health issues so people can live healthy and rewarding lives in our communities,” Gladstein said.
Susan Piacenti, Newport Mental Health’s vice president of philanthropy, says Gladstein’s wealth of experience often offers valuable teaching moments for staff. Employees would have a “really serious conversation,” Piacenti said, and Gladstein would respond by relating that chat with a personal experience that happened 20 years ago in her career.
“[Gladstein is] a good person, and she’s a good leader and she’s humble,” Piacenti said. “She’s not afraid to say, ‘I don’t know that, but I’m going to find out.’ ”
Piacenti also says Gladstein’s leadership makes people feel good about what they are doing, that they are part of something bigger than themselves, which is why people are drawn to nonprofit work.
Even with her busy schedule, Gladstein finds time to continue giving back to the community in other ways. She serves on the boards of several other local organizations, including the Substance Use Mental Health Leadership Council, Rhode Island Coalition for Children and Families, Horizon Pharmacy and Horizon Healthcare Partners.
When recently informing Gladstein of her recognition for her years of service, Piacenti and fellow Newport Mental Health employees joined together to offer their boss heartwarming letters. The written words drove home Gladstein’s impact on both her staff and the community at large.
“She was so moved by [the letters], tears in her eyes,” Piacenti said. “It was a really nice moment of women supporting women. The business world can be a tough one, obviously, and the behavioral field can be challenging day to day.”
