Editors’ Note

Dr. Tamarah Duperval-Brownlee (“Dr. Tam”) is the inaugural Chief Health Officer of Accenture and is charged with creating and innovating strategies to enhance health, safety, and well-being of 700,000+ associates and their families across the globe. Her career spans more than two decades of senior leadership in healthcare, focused on improving health and advancing health equity. Previous roles included senior vice president and chief community impact officer at Ascension, a nonprofit Catholic health ministry in the U.S. Before that, she practiced clinical family medicine and served as a clinical and operational leader in Academic Health Centers and Federally Qualified Health Centers. She has a BS degree in chemical engineering, an MD degree, an MS degree in public health, and an Executive MBA. She was recognized in 2021 by Modern Healthcare as one of the Top 25 Women Leaders and by Fierce Healthcare as a Woman of Influence.

Company Brief

Accenture (accenture.com) is a leading global professional services company that helps the world’s leading businesses, governments, and other organizations build their digital core, optimize their operations, accelerate revenue growth, and enhance citizen services – creating tangible value at speed and scale. Accenture is a talent and innovation led company with 738,000 people serving clients in more than 120 countries. Technology is at the core of change today, and Accenture is one of the world’s leaders in helping drive that change.

Will you discuss your role as Chief Health Officer at Accenture and how you focus your efforts?

As Chief Health Officer, I embrace my personal purpose of enabling people to live healthy and well. We recognize that this can look very different for individuals, given our global diversity of people, and my team excels at being nimble and agile in terms of meeting those varied needs. We are delivering on a global strategy with approaches that are locally and culturally relevant to our people.

We’re committed to putting a scientific rigor behind what we do – making sure the tools, support, and efforts we provide are equitable, holistic, and delivering desired outcomes that align to our overall mission: helping people thrive personally and professionally. Part of how we determine impact is through measurement. Understanding (from anonymized data) trends around how utilization of health and wellness benefits influences metrics, like attrition and engagement, can help inform whether we’re moving in the right direction and the impact we’re delivering for our people.

How is Accenture working to create strategies to enhance the health, safety, and well-being of its associates across the globe?

At Accenture, our overall health and well-being strategy is focused on three main areas:

• We’re working on shifting mindsets and behaviors of our people, particularly leaders, to prioritize and integrate health and well-being into their daily operations and interactions. This includes bringing the “superpowers” of empathy, compassion, and kindness to the fore.

• We’re also adapting ways of working to be flexible for virtual or in-person arrangements, leveraging technology for efficiency while fostering a culture of compassion and well-being. This includes encouraging meaningful check-ins among team members where there’s an opportunity to pause, think, reflect, and reset.

• We have also optimized how we provide access to services and resources that address the genuine needs of our people. We’ve created a Mental Well-being Hub to ensure easy access to tools that can help with issues like parenting support, sleep and relaxation, and building resilience, and have expanded access so that immediate family members can tap into these benefits, too. We’re broadening our resources to include financial health support, as we recognize the stress and anxiety caused by the global economic landscape.

In taking a holistic approach we also consider the broader support network around our people. We’re fortunate to have an active community of leaders working to set the tone from the top, and a strong network of Employee Resource Groups who help carry the message that it is critical to prioritize your health so you can thrive both personally and professionally.

Another unique enabler is our force of trained Mental Health Allies, in every country where we operate, who provide compassionate support and help guide our people to professional mental health resources. Allyship is so important when we think of leveraging the power of our people to help lead in this effort of well-being. To that end, we’ve recently established our Allies in Action program, which brings together all existing and new allies (including Mental Health and Pride Allies, Disability Inclusion and Cross-Cultural Champions) via learning, events, and community building, to learn what it means to be an ally, practice inclusive behaviors, and be role models for others.

Will you highlight Accenture’s efforts to develop solutions to impact the shifting COVID-19 landscape and support the behavioral and mental resilience for its more than 700,000 associates worldwide?

It’s important to recognize that even though we are out of the height of the pandemic, overall health and well-being, and especially mental health, may experience reverberations for 3-5 years to come. Because of that, it is going to be very important for places of work to double-down on efforts to support their people’s health. Of all the dimensions of health, mental health tends to be the area that suffers the most, and it is a particular focus for us at Accenture. We understand how intricately it is linked to other dimensions of health, such as social connection and belonging, and our activations and efforts will be directed to supporting those pieces as well.

Accenture’s 2022 Future of Work research revealed that companies supporting and enabling workers in new ways can unlock their full human potential, regardless of their location. We know how critical it is for us to create a sense of community and ensure that our people feel supported and valued, even if they are not working in a traditional office setting on a regular basis.

What are your views on the need to address the issue of health equity in the workplace and how is Accenture addressing this issue?

As a global organization, the discussion about health equity is at the forefront. We recognize that perspectives on health, and how people view their path to being healthy, can vary greatly. Our approach is to respond to this diversity with cultural humility while striving to establish a common standard in our benefits and programs. Our goal is to ensure that everyone has the opportunity to live a healthy and well life in a way that is meaningful to them.

This topic is personally important to me as a physician who provided care to under-resourced communities for many years. At Accenture, inclusion and diversity are ingrained in all aspects of what we do and help drive the success of our people and business outcomes. We care deeply about our people and are committed to fostering a culture of equality where everyone can achieve their personal and professional aspirations. Central to this is ensuring the health and well-being of all our people.

Our culture of equality acts as an accelerator for innovation, enabling us to deliver comprehensive value, devise better solutions for our clients, and inspire their own efforts toward inclusion and diversity. I strive to understand and act on the diverse needs of our people across different cultures, geographies, and demographics, and we are committed to ensuring access to care and support for all.

What advice do you offer young people beginning their careers?

Knowing your “why” is critical and getting clear on your purpose is so important. Purpose is where your skills meet needs, and there will be times when your skills and the needs you meet may differ. There is a lot of pressure on young people around this notion of a “dream job,” but maybe there isn’t one anymore. What people should aim to create is a career journey of continuous learning, with lots of stops along the way where they can express their purpose.