Gates Foundation Executive to Become President of CARE

By Ian Wilhelm

After five years fighting HIV and AIDS in Africa and India as a top executive of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, Helene D. Gayle will soon be working to defeat global social ills in a very different role.

Last month Dr. Gayle was appointed president of CARE, an international aid charity in Atlanta.

While many nonprofit officials would consider the Gates position a dream job, thanks to the foundation's prestige and wealth — Dr. Gayle alone oversaw $1.5-billion in grants during her tenure — she says she wants to join CARE to solve global health problems by focusing on the conditions that cause diseases to spread.

"This is an opportunity that allows me to take what I've done in the area of health and look at the issues that are responsible for the differences we see in health status among people around the world, like poverty, gender inequity, and lack of human rights," says Dr. Gayle, who names Nelson Mandela, the former president of South Africa, as one of her inspirations.

Dr. Gayle is the second health executive to depart the foundation in recent months. Richard D. Klausner, the fund's director of global-health programs, resigned last month after coming under Congressional scrutiny for possible violations of conflict-of-interest policies while awarding government contracts when he was director of the National Cancer Institute from 1995 to 2001. He has denied any wrongdoing and said the investigation did not prompt his resignation. Dr. Gayle says her decision to leave the foundation is unrelated to the departure of her boss.

Before joining the foundation, Dr. Gayle, 50, served with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, in Atlanta, as an epidemiologist and later led its effort to help stop the spread of tuberculosis and sexually transmitted diseases.

As director of the Gates Foundation's HIV, tuberculosis, and reproductive-health program, Dr. Gayle is credited with starting HIV/AIDS programs in Botswana and India that have served as models for other nations fighting the disease.

Dr. Gayle, who grew up in Buffalo, N.Y., will assume her role at CARE by April 1 and will earn $375,000, an increase from her salary at the Gates Foundation and an amount higher than her predecessor, Peter Bell, made. During the organization's last fiscal year, which ended in June, he received $346,014 in total compensation.

The new position will present several challenges to Dr. Gayle, including managing 12,000 employees worldwide — a sizable increase from the 50 people she currently oversees — and making the switch from a grant maker to a fund raiser.

CARE is one of the most successful fund-raising organizations in the world, garnering more than $172-million in private donations during its last fiscal year. Of course, Dr. Gayle's connection with the Gates fund may help her in this regard; since 2000, the Gates Foundation has given CARE more than $30-million.

In an interview, Dr. Gayle discussed how she will handle her new responsibilities.

Why did you decide to join CARE?

The job presented me with an incredible opportunity to work with an organization that's historic and excellent, and to broaden the things I've worked on in the health arena. It was obviously a very difficult decision because the Gates Foundation is a unique opportunity and it's been wonderful to be here for the last five years.

So you are not dissatisfied with your current position?

No, not at all. It's definitely not because of wanting to leave the foundation. I continue to enjoy the work that I do here, but the opportunity at CARE offers me some growth opportunities in areas that would be very rewarding.

How will your background in public health affect CARE?

I went into public health because I wanted to have a practical way to address some of the world's great inequities and address issues of social justice. The indirect cause for why some people are at greater risk than others for health problems is really societal drivers. At CARE I will have the ability to look at those and use what I've developed in public-health skills and apply them to these broader issues. How do you change some of the intractable social issues that we have? How do you work with communities to get them to be empowered, to make a change in their life?

Are you hoping to focus CARE more on infectious diseases?

CARE is not a health organization, so I'm not going there with the mission to turn it into a health organization. But clearly the issues of poverty and health are very intertwined.I want to spend some time getting to know the organization and think about some of the ways my background can help to shape the strategic agenda of the organization underthe rubric of poverty reduction, which will continue to be the major focus.

On what other social ills do you hope to focus CARE's efforts?

Well, again, there are many issues linked with its mission. Gender inequity, for example. We know that with a disease like HIV a lot of what is now fueling the growth of HIV is among women. We know that some of that has to do with power dynamics between genders. So issues like that will be important to look at. How can you change women's empowerment economically, socially, so that they are able to be in a better position to secure a good life for themselves, for their family, and for their children?

Are you nervous about having to raise funds in your new position?

Well, it's an essential part of it. And I've not worked for an organization where fund raising is part of the responsibilities. But fund raising is basically: How do you sell things you believe in? And in a variety of ways, that's what I've done all my life. The same skills I've used in other jobs are the same skills that transfer into fund raising. For instance, when you're in government you have to sell your budget to the U.S. Congress.

Other differences you foresee?

It will be different in not having the automatic entry that we have with both the resources and the people connected to the Gates Foundation. But I believe the world wants to know more about the kind of issues that CARE is involved in. The issues of poverty reduction are moving up on the global priority scale. With champions like Bono, this will be an issue that people will want to hear about.

ABOUT HELENE D. GAYLE, INCOMING PRESIDENT OF CARE

Education: Earned a bachelor's degree from Barnard College, in New York, in 1976, and a dual master's degree in public health from the Johns Hopkins University, in Baltimore, and medical degree from the University of Pennsylvania, in Philadelphia, in 1981.

Previous employment: Dr. Gayle has served as the director for the National Center for HIV, STD, and TB Prevention at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Currently she is the director of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation's HIV, tuberculosis, and reproductive health program. She also serves on the boards of the Institute of Medicine and the Council on Foreign Relations.

Favorite musicians: Stevie Wonder, Sarah Vaughn, and John Coltrane.

Books she's reading: The World Is Flat: A Brief History of the Twenty-First Century, by Thomas Friedman; Winning, by Jack Welch; and On Beauty, by Zadie Smith.