Congratulations to the Bellwether Class of 2025

George S. Godfrey

George S. Godfrey never met a challenge, obstacle or problem that he — or in tandem with this team — couldn't solve — whether using simple communication, alternative, atypical sourcing or complex technology. For example, during the global COVID-19 pandemic, he tapped a manufacturer that made airbags and seatbelts for automobiles to produce durably reusable and sustainable gowns. With his organization's innovation team, he worked with an existing sales platform to facilitate and enable improved communication and match exception via an application that his organization now markets externally as a revenue source. Within his southeastern integrated delivery network (IDN), clinicians and administrators alike know that he is their proven and trusted go-to team leader to get things done.

Pat Neff Groner (1920-2012)

Pat Neff Groner (1920-2012) deservedly earned the tribute, "a man of ideas and action," past the midway point of his career based on all that he had accomplished by that time — and he still had more years to go. After all, he led and innovated a hospital at a relatively young age for an administrator in 1950 (he was 30), co- founded a healthcare research institute in the mid-1950s, co-founded a leading group purchasing organization (GPO) with a small group of hospital administrators he recruited in 1973, and then graduated to a leadership role in higher education. In fact, the GPO he spearheaded as a vehicle to empower nonprofit and not-for-profit healthcare organizations grew to become the largest GPO today in terms of membership, participation, purchasing volume and services. His pioneering expertise touched academia, administration, assisted living, insurance, supply chain, surgical services, technological development and venture research.

Jo Klein (1949-2024)

Jo Klein (1949-2024) represented the style and type of supply chain executive that involved rolling up sleeves and plunging headfirst into investigating and researching how purchasers and suppliers transacted business, and exploring how the complex marketplace worked both collaboratively and competitively to advance progressive thinking while reinforcing high-quality patient care service. Through her GPO roots Klein forged ties with academia, clinical service, distribution, finance and manufacturing to establish and solidify participant activity in a high-stakes exercise that meant the difference between life and death, success and failure. Through her pioneering efforts, Klein cemented educational and informational connections between academia and business, emphasized the features and benefits of supply chain data standards and extolled the virtues of evidence-based analysis and decision-making. Along the way, Klein engaged and nurtured countless professional relationships, and in retirement, translated all of her attributes and qualities into Parkinson's research, earning her the well-deserved nickname "Alpha Chick" by her friends in the Dallas Area Parkinson's Society for her dedicated, devoted, disciplined, methodical, purpose-driven and results-oriented service.

Michael T. Langlois

Michael T. Langlois spent his supply chain career consistently swimming upstream against the tide of status quo, emphasizing value analysis as an essential component of supply chain performance excellence that included the critical engagement of clinicians — physicians and nurses — to keep the product and service pipeline flowing and fluid. To wit, he developed a simulation application that enabled supply chain team members to practice engagement strategy scenarios and perform role-playing exercises to work with clinicians in product and service assessments and decisions. Langlois has guided supply chain operations through organizational mergers, foundational self-distribution modeling and consolidated service center development. He even launched a GPO to service merged IDNs and participated early on in the formation of the forerunner to Strategic Marketplace Initiative, building communication bridges between healthcare supply chain executives and leaders with those in other industry sectors.

Joni Rittler

Joni Rittler didn't just conceive, create, develop, launch and oversee a consolidated service center for the largest children's hospital in Pennsylvania, but also for the local economy and population base of the Philadelphia metropolitan area. As the healthcare organization expanded its community reach and footprint, Rittler maintained steady-as- she-goes supply chain service, building trust with clinicians. When Rittler came on board, she immediately embarked on turning around the organization's supply chain enterprise, from switching enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems to implementing procurement software to establishing the CSC that used local and minority-owned businesses for a variety of service contracts. Rittler shared her experience and expertise as a mentoring leader within the Children's Hospital Association, educating other hospital executives with valuable insights on performance improvement initiatives. She also established a family fund to support the education and development of supply chain professionals.

Claude J. Trafas (1923-2015)

Claude J. Trafas (1923-2015) embodied the traditional bread-and-butter, meat-and-potatoes, no-nonsense supply chain fundamentals that made him such an influential and foundational leader from the 1950s through the 1980s. Much of his personal and professional scruples and work ethic was honed during his extensive combat, intelligence and recon experience in World War II, which cost him a limb. Trafas was a staunch and vocal advocate for centralizing the materials management function so that it operated like an actual business, a philosophy that was germinating and simmering just below the surface of standard practice. He was instrumental in promoting the blossoming GPO industry in the 1970s, founding the first statewide purchasing and group purchasing associations in Delaware. He extolled an ethical hard line on supply chain conduct, urging hospitals to maintain their commitments to GPOs if they committed to one and not negotiate better deals on their own or cherry pick to improve bottom-line performance.

2025 Future Famers Honored

Future Famers 2025 Future Famers Class of 2025 - Left to Right

Reuben Philip, Director of Product, Clarium Inc., New York

Andrea C. Poulopoulos, Chief Supply Chain Officer, Corewell Health, Grand Rapids, MI

Nicole Schmidt, RT (R)(VI), System Director, Clinical Supply Optimization, Spend Management, The University of Kansas Health System, Kansas City, KS

2024 Future Famers Honored

Future Famers 2024 Future Famers Class of 2024 - Left to Right

Angie Bruns, MHA, Senior Director, Spend Management and Administration, The University of Kansas Health System, Kansas City, KS

Chico Manning, MHA, System Vice President, Enterprise Supply Chain, PIH Health, Whittier, CA

Corey Schmidt, CMRP, MBA, Assistant Director, SHS Operations & Spend Management Integration, The University of Kansas Health System, Kansas City, KS

2023 Future Famers Honored

Future Famers 2023 Future Famers Class of 2023 - Left to right:

Rachel K. Anderson, Corporate Director, Supply Chain, Baptist Health, Montgomery, AL

Jesse L. Stanton, Vice President, Supply Chain, Parkview Health, Fort Wayne, IN

2022 Future Famers Honored

Future Famers 2022 Future Famers Class of 2022 - Left to right

Ryan R. Burke, Vice President, Strategic Sourcing, Pandion Optimization Alliance, Rochester, NY

René A. Gurdián, Assistant Vice President, Supply Chain Finance and Strategy. Ochsner Health, New Orleans, LA

Caroline Marion, Manager, Supply Chain Clinical Engagement and Implementation, Novant Health, Wilmington, NC

Allison T. Tidd, Assistant Vice President, Contracts, Atrium Health/Atrium Health Supply Chain Alliance, Charlotte, NC.

2020 Future Famers Honored

Future Famers 2020 Future Famers Class of 2020 - Left to right:

Hunter Chandler, Director, Supply Chain Information Systems, Wake Forest Baptist Medical Center, Winston-Salem, NC

Jack Koczela, Director of Services, Supply Chain, Froedtert Health Integrated Service Center, Menomonee Falls, WI

Kenneth Scher, CMRP, Vice President, End-to-End Supply Chain, Nexera Inc., New York

2019 Future Famers Honored

Future Famers 2019 Future Famers Class of 2019 - Left to right: Geisinger Health’s Jun B. Amora, Memorial Health System’s Erin M. Bromley, Avera Health’s Sara M. Henderson, Mid-America Service Solutions’ Jessica Rinderle and Dartmout-Hitchcock Health’s Sidney L. Hamilton. Not pictured: The University of Kansas Health System’s Brian A. Dolan.

2018 Future Famers Honored

Future Famers 2018 Future Famers Class of 2018 - Standing (left to right): Troy Compardo, Amy Chieppa and Andy Leaders. Not pictured: Ryan Rotar.

2017 Future Famers Honored

Future Famers 2017 Future Famers Class of 2017 - Standing (left to right): Mark Growcott, Ph.D., Karen Kresnik, R.N., and Ben Cahoy. Not pictured: Derek Havens and Christy Crestin.

2016 Future Famers Honored

Future Famers 2016 Future Famers Class of 2016 - Standing (left to right): Erik Walerius, Nisha Lulla and Rob Proctor. Not pictured: Jimmy Henderson, Kate Polczynski and Baljeet Sangha.

2015 Future Famers Honored

Future Famers 2015 Future Famers Class of 2015 - Standing (left to right): University of Chicago’s Eric Tritch, Ochsner Health’s Will Barrette, Providence Health’s Justin Freed, Mercy Health/St. Rita’s Jason Hays, Parkview Health’s Donna Van Vlerah and Texas Health’s Nate Mickish (back and to the right).

2025 Dean S. Ammer Award for Healthcare Supply Chain Performance Excellence

Allison Corry, former Chief Supply Chain Officer, Intermountain Health, Salt Lake City, UT

Jason R. Moulding, FACHE, FAHRMM, Chief Supply Chain Officer & Vice President, Performance Management, MultiCare Health, and President, Myriadd Supply Network and Strategies, Tacoma, WA

2024 Dean S. Ammer Award for Healthcare Supply Chain Performance Excellence

Amanda Chawla, MBA, MHA, FACHE, CMRP, Vice President and Chief Supply Chain Officer, Stanford Medicine, Palo Alto, CA

Anand S. Joshi, M.D., MBA, Senior Vice President, Procurement and Strategic Sourcing, New York-Presbyterian Hospital, New York

2023 Dean S. Ammer Award for Healthcare Supply Chain Performance Excellence

Michael McCullough, Senior Vice President, Supply Chain, Wellstar Health System, Marietta, Google Analytics

Régine Honoré Villain, Vice President, Supply Chain Network and Chief Supply Chain Officer, Ochsner Health, Baton Rouge, LA

2021 Dean S. Ammer Award for Healthcare Supply Chain Performance Excellence

Ammer Award 2021 Donna Van Vlerah, Senior Vice President, Supply & Support Services, Support Division, Parkview Health, Fort Wayne, IN

2020 Dean S. Ammer Award for Healthcare Supply Chain Performance Excellence

Ammer Award 2020 Randy V. Bradley, Ph.D., CPHIMS, FHIMSS, Associate Professor of Supply Chain Management and Information Systems, University of Tennessee Knoxville, Haslam College of Business, Department of Supply Chain Management

2017 Ammer Award Honoree Organization

Ammer Award 2017 Mayo Clinic’s Jim Francis accepts the 2017 Dean S. Ammer Award for Supply Chain Excellence, on behalf of his Ammer Level 5 Supply Chain Organization.

2016 Inaugural Ammer Award

Ammer Award 2016 Michael Louviere accepts the inaugural Dean S. Ammer Award for Supply Chain Excellence on behalf of his Supply Chain team at Ochsner Health System.