Meet Jennifer Woods, senior events specialist at Kettering Health Network. Jennifer was born and raised in Dayton, Ohio. Jennifer has worked with the network for 19 years. She started her time with the network as a three-week part-time temp worker in the marketing department, filling in for someone that was on medical leave. She ended up staying for five months and left for a short time to fulfill a different temp assignment. After three months, she returned to the network to work full-time and has worked in marketing within different roles and has been in her current role of senior events specialist for the past year.
Jennifer shares that her greatest accomplishment at the network thus far has been figuring out how to have events in the midst of the pandemic. She had to become an expert in something she had never done before. In that transition, she found new and more effective ways to have facility and expansion ribbon cuttings, virtual community open houses, drive-thru graduation celebrations, a virtual employee recognition event with a live nationally known artist, and a socially distant outdoor concert—all new ways of doing things. People are what inspire Jennifer in her work, whether it’s her coworkers, clients within the network, vendors, or the community. Knowing that she’s working on or planning something that will make a direct impact on what people experience or creates an awareness of new health care access close to them is what keeps her going! The piece of advice Jennifer gives is, “Find a career that matches what you would do even if you didn’t get paid for it, and, trust the process. Before working for the network, I never wanted to work in marketing, because I thought marketing always included sales. I’m NOT a salesperson. I’ve since learned that there are so many different areas in marketing. For the network alone, we have marketers, writers, designers, videographers, public relations reps, social media reps, project managers, and event coordinators.” Jennifer also recently accepted the position of board chair at her church, Omega Baptist Church, making her the first female to hold this title.