CFO As A Strategic Architect
This full-day event is specially curated to position the CFO as a leader, and not just an accountant. Harness your skills as a bridge-builder, mentor, and coach, as well as sharpen your abilities to build financial frameworks, optimize budgets, and succeed with value-based reimbursement.
Summit Chair &
Senior Associate,
OPEN MINDS
Join your financial executive peers and discover the key components for strategic scenario planning, including forecasting and ROI analysis, discover your role in organizational growth through mergers, acquisitions, and partnerships, and understand the value of managed care relationship development.
Building High-Value Managed Care Partnerships: Key Approaches To Sustainable Relationship Development
Strong managed care partnerships have become essential to financial sustainability and strategic growth of behavioral health organizations. In this session, we’ll hear two executive perspectives on how to lead the development of resilient, mutually beneficial relationships with health plans that drive reimbursement strength, quality performance, and long-term sustainability.
The session will unpack the executive team’s role in shaping payer strategy – from preparing compelling organizational value propositions and negotiating contract terms to using data to demonstrate outcomes, reduce friction, and strengthen trust with managed care partners.
Attendees will explore:
- How to analyze payer mix, model contract impacts, and align financial operations with performance expectations
- Practical frameworks, negotiation insights, and communication strategies to enhance payer collaboration and secure favorable terms
- How to position organizations as high-value, reliable partners in a competitive and rapidly evolving managed care environment
Matt Kresic, MPA
Mr. Kresic brings more than 33 years of experience in nonprofit child welfare and behavioral health, with leadership experience spanning direct practice, program coordination, operations, and executive administration. He has been with Cadence Care Network since 1993, serving as a Case Manager, Independent Living Program Coordinator, and Director of Operations before being appointed President and Chief Executive Officer in 2010. Today, Cadence Care Network provides Treatment Foster Care, comprehensive mental health services, and care coordination to more than 8,000 children across Ohio each year.
Throughout his tenure, Mr. Kresic has emphasized innovation, creativity, and a growth mindset as drivers of organizational impact. Under his leadership, Cadence Care Network has grown from 28 employees serving three counties in Northeast Ohio to approximately 420 employees with locations across central and northern Ohio. This growth has strengthened the organization’s ability to advance its mission of helping those it serves live their most successful lives.
Mr. Kresic earned his undergraduate degree in Social Work from Youngstown State University and his master’s degree in public administration, with a focus in nonprofit management, from Kent State University.
He also served for 10 years as an adjunct professor at Youngstown State University in the Bitonte College of Health and Human Services.
Deeply committed to community service, Mr. Kresic is active in local and statewide initiatives that support children, families, and individuals with developmental and behavioral health needs. He serves as a board member of Abilities Unite and is a long-standing member of the Trumbull County Family and Children First Council, in addition to other board and advisory roles with child-serving organizations. At the state level, he serves on the Ohio Children’s Alliance Board and the OhioRISE Advisory Board, and he was recently appointed by Governor Mike DeWine to the Children and Youth Advisory Council at the Ohio Department of Children and Youth.
Mr. Kresic is also a dedicated advocate for children, families, and providers across Ohio. He has testified before the Ohio Health and Human Services Finance Subcommittee and the Ohio Joint Medicaid Oversight Committee on multiple occasions. As a social worker and nonprofit leader, he views advocacy as an essential responsibility and an opportunity to elevate the needs of children and families served by Cadence Care Network and organizations across the state.
Marti Taylor
Marti Taylor has served as CEO of OhioRISE and Vice President at Aetna, a CVS Health company, for the past three years. OhioRISE is a specialty Medicaid plan that supports more than 65,000 youth with behavioral health needs across the state of Ohio. In this role, Marti has been instrumental in improving the lives of members by expanding access to innovative, community-based services statewide, including Intensive Home-Based Services and Psychiatric Residential Treatment Facilities. The outcomes of this unique program are not only showing excellent clinical and social outcomes but also bending the cost curve.
Marti joined Aetna/OhioRISE after serving as President and CEO of OneFifteen and as Executive Director of Behavioral Health at Verily. In these roles, she led a cross-disciplinary team dedicated to modernizing addiction care through an innovative partnership with Verily, the life sciences division of Google. The Dayton-based treatment center helped thousands of individuals battling the disease of addiction.
Prior to founding OneFifteen, Marti built a distinguished career leading premier academic medical centers, advancing clinical care through research, teaching, and quality improvement. Until 2018, she served as CEO of University Hospital and the Ross Heart Hospital at The Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center.
Earlier in her career, Marti spent 25 years at Duke University Health System, where she began as a staff nurse in the Cardiac Intensive Care Unit at Duke University Hospital. Over time, she advanced into senior leadership roles, ultimately overseeing all aspects of the health system’s Heart Center across three hospitals and 12 affiliated sites.
Marti holds a Bachelor of Science in Nursing from Capital University and a Master of Science in Nursing from Duke University. She currently serves on the Board of Directors for The Commonwealth Fund and the Duke School of Nursing Board of Directors; she is the immediate past Chair of the Board of Trustees for Capital University. In addition, she is a founding member of the Ohio Institute for Substance Use Disorder Excellence. Her extensive board service also includes the Dayton Development Coalition, Ronald McDonald House Charities of Central Ohio, MedFlight, and the American Heart Association, along with other volunteer board positions. In March 2025, Marti received the Distinguished Alumna Award from the Duke University School of Nursing. She resides in Dublin with her husband, Rodney, and their two sons, Zachary and Andrew.
Mergers & Alliances: The Evolving Role of The CFO In Organizational Growth – M&A, Collaborations & Partnerships
As consolidation accelerates across the behavioral health landscape, CFOs are playing an increasingly strategic role in shaping the future of their organizations. This session examines how financial leaders can guide mergers, acquisitions, affiliations, and cross-sector partnerships that strengthen market position, expand service capacity, and advance mission-driven growth.
Participants will explore the full lifecycle of partnership development– from assessing organizational readiness and conducting rigorous financial and operational due diligence to structuring deals that balance risk, value, and long-term sustainability.
This session will provide:
- Emerging trends in collaborative models, including payer-provider partnerships, joint ventures and alliances that enhance care integration and access
- Practical tools to evaluate strategic fit, model financial impacts, lead negotiations, and communicate partnership value to internal and external stakeholders
- The insight needed to navigate complex decisions and drive successful, future-focused organizational strategy
Robert C. Dunne, CPA
Robert C. Dunne, CPA, has held the role of Devereux’s senior vice president and chief financial officer, treasurer since 2008. Dunne is responsible for the organization’s financial performance, as well as setting and implementing financial strategy and procedures across all centers. He also oversees all facility-related matters.
Dunne joined Devereux in 1992 and, since that time, has served in roles of increasing responsibility. Before joining the organization, he spent nine years at international accounting firm Ernst & Young, most recently in the role of senior manager.
Dunne holds a Bachelor of Science in accounting from La Salle University, and he earned his Certified Public Accountant certificate in 1985. He serves as an officer for substantially all Devereux affiliates, and participates on several nonprofit boards outside of Devereux.
Thomas Grant
Tom Grant was appointed Chief Financial Officer for Woods System of Care in March, 2016. Mr. Grant engages in short and long-range strategic and operational growth planning for the organization. He brings more than 20 years of finance and strategy consulting experience to the organization. Prior to coming to Woods, he ran his own management consulting firm specializing in efficiency initiatives, leadership, strategic planning, turn-arounds, and business development needs of both non-profit organizations and for-profit businesses. In this role, he served as the Chief Financial Officer for Archway Programs in New Jersey.
Before launching his own company, he held similar management consulting positions with a number of business development companies. Mr. Grant has counseled clients on a wide range of topics including process optimization, cash flow management, fund raising, structure, best practices, profitability and pricing arrangements. He also has worked as an emerging markets analyst in Thailand, Hong Kong, and a number of South American countries. Mr. Grant holds an MBA from the Darden School of Business of the University of Virginia and a bachelor’s degree from Davidson College.
The Revenue At Risk When Coverage Changes: A CFO Readiness Check On H.R. 1
Most finance teams can name their payer mix down to a percentage point. Far fewer can say how much revenue sits behind the consumers most likely to lose coverage, or how fast that revenue would go. The difference is not awareness of policy change itself – it is operational readiness to understand the financial exposure and respond before it impacts performance.
This panel runs the readiness check out loud. We’ll dive into how H.R. 1 is changing Medicaid eligibility, what a finance function needs in place to see the exposure early, and what organizations proactively setting themselves up for coverage changes are doing today.
Attendees will leave with:
- A gameplan for applying proactive strategies to prepare for eligibility changes and ultimately protect the bottom line
- An assessment of the financial impact of Medicaid eligibility changes on revenue and operational stabilityÂ
- A realistic view of how H.R. 1 is reshaping Medicaid eligibility requirements and what those changes mean for leaders of finance teams Â
Brett Darby
Brett Darby serves as Vice President of Revenue Cycle Client Development at Netsmart, where he leads growth and go-to-market strategies for the organization’s RCM division. He partners with human services leaders nationwide to help improve financial performance through a combination of technology, services and operational expertise. With more than two decades of healthcare technology and client development experience, Brett is focused on helping organizations achieve measurable and sustainable revenue cycle outcomes.
Krista Logan, J.D., MHSA
Krista Logan, J.D., MHSA, serves as Manager and Lead Regulatory Strategist of the Regulatory Strategy team at Netsmart, where she leverages her expertise in health care and law to drive strategic regulatory initiatives. She holds a Master’s in Health Services Administration and a Juris Doctor of Law from the University of Kansas. At Netsmart, she leads health IT regulatory research, education, and policy advocacy focused on interoperability, information blocking, and ONC Health IT Certification. In her role, she engages with federal and state agencies, industry associations, and provider stakeholders to elevate health IT developer and provider perspectives, translate regulatory and policy developments into actionable requirements, and support practical, technology‑enabled compliance across the Netsmart care continuum.
The CFO As System Architect: Rebuilding Finance Operations Around A New ERP
Most finance leaders inherit an accounting system someone else chose. Replacing it is one of the few decisions a CFO fully owns, and it sets what the finance team can and cannot do for the next decade.
This session follows an I/DD CFO through that rebuild, from the realization that a change is needed, through go-live and the months after. Attendees will hear what the organization got right, what it would do differently, and where the capacity gains exceeded expectations.
Attendees will leave with:
- A read on when an aging accounting system has become the constraint on growth, and how to make that case to a board
- The sequence of a full implementation, including the internal staffing and hours the project requires
- Where finance team capacity is recovered after go-live, and how long it takes to begin seeing the return
Adam B. Shuster, CPA, CIA, MBA
Adam Shuster is Chief Financial Officer of Incompass Human Services, a $60 million nonprofit organization supporting individuals with intellectual and developmental disabilities, autism, acquired brain injuries, and other complex needs throughout Northeastern and Central Massachusetts.
Since joining Incompass in 2018, Adam has served as a member of the Executive Leadership Team, helping shape both the organization’s financial direction and overall strategy. His responsibilities extend well beyond traditional finance, with Adam playing an active role in organizational strategy, planning, operations, and long-term sustainability.
Adam played an integral role in the planning and execution of the merger of LifeLinks, Inc. and CLASS, Inc., which created Incompass Human Services. He also led efforts that secured more than $10 million in pandemic-era relief funding, helping strengthen the organization during an unprecedented period.
Adam brings more than 20 years of nonprofit executive leadership experience to his role. Prior to joining Incompass, he held senior financial leadership positions with the American Lung Association of the Northeast and Easter Seals Massachusetts, with a focus on financial strategy, organizational restructuring, operational efficiency, and continuous process improvement.
A Certified Public Accountant and Certified Internal Auditor, Adam earned his MBA with high honors and his Bachelor of Science in Business Administration, magna cum laude, from Boston University. He also has a longstanding commitment to public service in his hometown of Ashland, Massachusetts, where he has served as Town Moderator since 2011.