BTM149 – Stacey Lewis and Ashley Hammond – VA’s Pathfinder Program
About Today’s Guest
Stacey Lewis has served the VHA for over a decade in both clinical and administrative roles. She started her career as a Radiologic Technologist at the VA Maine HCS before moving under the Quality Management Service Line, where she now leads strategic operations as a Lean Six Sigma Master Black Belt Candidate at the New England Center for Innovation Excellence (NECIE). Stacey recently served as an FY23 VHA Entrepreneur in Residence Fellow with the VHA Innovation Ecosystem where she led the national design and implementation of the VA Pathfinder program. VA Pathfinder operates as the digital front door to innovate or sell to VA, with a back-end data solution that democratizes access for innovators and vendors, across all sectors, wanting to work with VA. Under her leadership and expertise, VA Pathfinder is poised to transform the way businesses innovate and sell within and across the VA healthcare system.
Ashley Hammond is from Cincinnati, Ohio. Ashley started her VA career in 2009 at the Cincinnati VAMC as an Administrative Assistant. Ashley entered the VA supply chain/logistics community as a Technical Career Field (TCF) Intern in September 2015 and graduated from the program in August 2017. She has also held various positions within the Supply Chain, including Chief of Materiel Management. Ashley worked in the VHA Procurement and Logistics Office as a Project Manager. Ashley currently works in the Office of Procurement, Acquisition, and Logistics (OPAL) department in the Category Management Support Office (CMSO) as a Portfolio Manager, overseeing the Departments’ Information Technology category. Ashley also leads the Pathfinder program, an award-winning program which assists vendors in doing business with VA.
PsychArmor Resource of the Week
This week’s PsychArmor resource of the week is the PsychArmor course Course, Supporting Veteran-Owned Businesses: Supplier Diversity. In this course, you will learn strategies and best practices to implement Veteran supplier diversity in your business or organization. You can see find the course here: https://learn.psycharmor.org/courses/Supporting-Veteran-Owned-Businesses.
Theme Music
Our theme music Don’t Kill the Messenger was written and performed by Navy Veteran Jerry Maniscalco, in cooperation with Operation Encore, a non profit committed to supporting singer/songwriter and musicians across the military and Veteran communities.
This Episode Sponsored By:
This episode is sponsored by PsychArmor, the premier education and learning ecosystem specializing in military culture content. PsychArmor offers an online e-learning laboratory with custom training options for organizations.
Producer and Host Duane France is a retired Army Noncommissioned Officer, combat veteran, and clinical mental health counselor for service members, veterans, and their families. You can find more about the work that he is doing at www.veteranmentalhealth.com
