Coast Mental Health With Keir Macdonald, CEO

A warrior’s quest to defeat mental illness can be quite tough, especially if you are a lone warrior. But having someone behind your back, providing you with the essential pillars of recovery makes a difference. Leading the quest is Keir Macdonald, the CEO of Coast Mental Health, who brings valuable insights into what it’s like to harness the power of a leader in one of the largest and most respective nonprofit organizations in British Columbia. He delves more into the organization by looking at the strategic planning and working with an energized and professional team. We will also get a clear-eyed look at being a new leader in a large organization. Let’s tune in to this episode and be a warrior in helping others find their meaningful place in the community.

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Coast Mental Health With Keir Macdonald, CEO

In this episode, we have Keir Macdonald. Keir is the CEO of Coast Mental Health, a multi-service agency dedicated to providing support, advocating, and promoting the recovery of people with mental illness. In our conversation, Keir talks about what it’s like as CEO of one of the largest, most respected social profit organizations in British Columbia, what he’s excited about, learning more about the organization, looking forward to strategic planning, and working with an energized and professional team. Keir shares a very clear-eyed look at what it’s like to be a new leader in a larger organization. There’s a lot of learning and a lot of advice that he shares with all of our readers. You don’t want to miss this conversation with Keir Macdonald.

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Welcome to the show, Keir.

Thanks for having me on.

Keir, I’m looking forward to the conversation. The day has finally arrived. I know a lot of our readers are going to learn about the transition you’ve made professionally, moving from your old position or your previous position to CEO at Coast. We’ll get to that in a minute. First, I want you to tell us a little bit about the organization that you lead now, who it serves, and what it looks like on a day-to-day basis to see that mission and action.

I’ll try and reduce all of that into one response. Coast Mental Health is a nonprofit charity. We focus on three pillars, which are housing, support services, and employment and education. We’re dedicated to support, advocate for, and promote the sustained recovery of people living with mental illness. In 2022, we celebrated 50 years of delivering community-based services in mental health across Greater Vancouver, in the Lower Mainland.

As an organization, you have a tremendous reputation as a leader in those three areas that you outlined. I imagine your phone and your email are filled up with organizations or people outside of the Lower Mainland wanting the expertise of your organization. How do you maintain that focus on the community that you serve now and still add value to the communities that may be geographically a little bit further away?

It’s tough. I’m so lucky at an organization like Coast to have subject matter expertise that we have within the staff group and leadership group. It’s quite an unusual transition to joining an organization, not just replacing a CEO with 35 years, but coming to a director team with 3 people with over 30 years of service, I’m fortunate to have so many experienced day-to-day leaders within the organization doing the organization’s work. I do love the system work. As you say, I love connecting with leaders within our service area but also outside because so many across the province and the country are struggling with similar challenges. It’s always great to look at success in other areas as well.

It’s an interesting point because it’s often a healthy tension. Sometimes, it’s not always healthy, but if the tension’s there, the idea is that the solutions to important social issues must be based in the community where those issues are occurring and for the benefit and including the people involved. As you said, there are such similarities across the country when it comes to issues of mental health and housing. How do you draw that line between what is community first and what is happening across society?

We try to take care of day-to-day and try to have some focus on our own mission and mandate. That’s to continue delivering quality services to those in our programs and our clients and people who interact with our services. It’s tough with so much going on and, quite frankly, even sometimes noise across different areas, but it’s essential that we focus internally first.

Sometimes, trying to focus internally and be successful in those services requires you to be aware of what’s going on around you. I see that as part of my role as CEO to make sure that we’re getting tapped into that knowledge, that expertise, what’s going on elsewhere, what’s working elsewhere, but also where we’re similar and different and how to draw on the expertise of others and through that network.

It’s rare that we are the only ones going through something. As I said, we’re lucky to have tremendous experience on the staff team on the day-to-day. However, as we look at some of the big systemic challenges and the big social issues that are confronting society and our country, more and more it requires that we be more connected and more aware of what’s going on around us.

One of the issues that I know you’ve spent a lot of time on and your colleagues at Coast spend a lot of time on is the de-stigmatization of mental health. It’s something where, on our show over the last couple of years, we’ve had a number of guests who say that that’s the next step we need to focus on de-stigmatizing mental health. Are we making progress on that, Keir?

I like to think so. It’s hard not to hear that being more part of the conversation. COVID and the pandemic went some ways to normalize that. There are a couple of distinctions to make. One is you talk about mental health, the other is mental illness. In terms of the discussion around mental health, it has improved. We hear that term a lot more. In terms of the strategies to address the investments to address and support those living with mental illness, we’re probably not there yet. I’d say that there’s more work to be done, but I’m optimistic, given the topic and the de-stigmatization of folks with the topic around mental health is an improvement from where we’ve been 5 or 10 years ago.

You mentioned earlier the effect of COVID on our understanding of mental illness and mental health. There’s also been a number of other concerning statistics that have come out of the pandemic or that we’re seeing as a result of the pandemic. Many of the issues facing on housed population and others in our community have gotten much worse. How do you keep your team focused on what needs to be done in the face of rising needs and the growing concerns of the community?

It’s hard because this need shows in our programs at our doorstep. It’s hard not to hear about it. It’s staggering the impacts of some of these crises. You talk about the drug poisoning crisis. We’re losing seven people a day and even the coroners’ release of the July numbers, nearly another 200 in July. We’re trending towards a higher number than previous records. Every year, the last couple of years, it has been increasing, over 2,300 lives.

The scale of the problem is so significant, but how that’s experienced in the organization is very real. We do experience those events. Staff are responding to those events. It’s a combination of figuring out, for Coast, how things are impacting us internally, like what initiatives and responses we have available to help keep people safe, to help keep them alive, and how we are equipping staff to respond to deal with the trauma from those responses.

Keep people safe to help keep them alive. Click To Tweet

More and more, you hear topics around mental health in the workplace, but it’s trauma that our staff are experiencing in responding to these events. There’s a huge focus internally. The other part of my hat, I’m deeply troubled at a community, at a provincial, and national level at how far and progressed we are, where our response is, and the staggering loss of lives that we continue to see. Also, those policy discussions and advocacy work. There are always things we can be doing internally to move the needle a little bit and to try and keep people in our programs as safe as possible as well. We don’t want to lose sight of those steps as well while we’re advocating for broader systemic solutions.

You’ve touched on what I think of as the magic power of leaders in the social services sector, which is the ability to meet individual clients, patients, and people that you’re working with on the front lines where they are and support them in their trauma support. Your team is incurring that trauma themselves or witnessing it. At the same time, you keep your head up focusing on the big social policy changes that are going to be required to change the tide of events over a period of time. As a leader, how do you think about that immediacy of the moment, what’s happening in a Coast program nowadays or will happen tomorrow, and those conversations you’re having with cabinet ministers and premiers about what needs to change to address issues like the poison drug crisis?

It’s a juggle, honestly. You talk about that being one of the biggest challenges for leaders is balancing those two. Every organization’s a little bit different as well. Too often, leaders are forced to be too operationally focused because of, in some ways, inadequate resourcing internally. The CEO or the executive director finds themselves doing too much day-to-day operational work. It’s trying to be more mindful of when I drift and can drift too far to that advocacy, policy, or systems piece. Maybe I’m not feeling as attuned to day-to-day. The quick correction for that is I love popping up in programs and doing tours. I love connecting with staff and clients as you talk about, but one serves the other.

The more I do that, I find that I’m better able to speak on behalf of the organization. I’m better able to translate how things are being experienced and showing up in a program to funders and to those in power. If you can’t personalize that impact, it becomes very theoretical. That’s why people often, politicians in particular, love speaking with people with lived experience or people who are working in programs sometimes more than leaders like myself.

They like to cut through and understand what’s happening at the ground level. It’s so important as a leader to stay connected to the work people, to those that you are here to support, to help feed that advocacy to understand what impacts are in programs and help sometimes also inspire those solutions that are required.

I remember years ago speaking to an elected official who was involved in a conversation about advocating for some research funding. His line was, “Don’t show me a graph. Tell me a story.” I was like, “The next twenty minutes of our presentation are all graphs, so we’re going to have to pivot.” I think that it can be challenging, thinking on your leadership team and you’ve referenced the tremendous experience you have in your leadership team. You’ve got leaders who are directly responsible for what’s happening in programs at your sites on a day-to-day basis.

At the same time, you can be hearing those issues, helping support them in those issues, and then having a conversation about adjusting policies at that 10,000-meter level. You said juggling, but how do you juggle it? When you look at your schedule for the course of a week and you see you’ve got a lot of on-the-ground work, mission-forward work, and some advocacy work sprinkled in, how do you get ready for that week or those conversations?

It’s a little bit like looking at the calendar for what’s coming up this week. Part of it as well is those that help with scheduling and things like that, trying to balance the schedule. There is a sweet spot when I’m finding myself, as I said, getting too much in a certain camp. A sweet spot for me is a bit of a sprinkling and a bit of a balance of all of those areas you talk about.

We’re in our senior executive team meeting one morning, so I get to connect with those other leaders. Normally, on a Monday morning, we’d have our management team meeting, so starting a week, we are connecting to the leaders in the organization, understanding where things are at over the weekend and how we’re set up for the week.

Connecting with our day-to-day leaders is a big priority for me. However, as the week is going on, I’m into some programs. The structure for me is making sure I’ve got some of that balance. On Friday, we’re doing some strategic planning for the Tri-Cities Homelessness and Housing Task Group, a group that I co-chair. It is one of those classics where we’re doing a little bit of both, showcasing the organization but also some of the system pieces.

I’m pretty busy. I’ve got board pieces in there as well. That’s the other thing we don’t talk about as much, but it’s also a big part of the role. There are some weeks that are probably better balanced than others, but a steady week where I’m getting a mix of those different opportunities to engage. I feed off them in different ways. It’s being mindful that you can get overwhelmed with the schedule. It’s one of the things I’m learning a little bit more about as I’ve been in the role, but I’m trying to make sure you’ve got space in between.

Make sure you’ve got time for the conversations that need to happen. Create some space in your schedule so that things will happen in 24/7 service delivery that requires your attention. If you’re too blocked to respond and support, it’s a bit of a challenge. I’m not there. I’m not by far. Others will tell you it’s not perfect, but it’s something I’m aware of and always looking to improve.

As leaders, it’s challenging to set it up for your own energy, where you get energy, and how you’re going to be your best self when you show up to match that to the realities of your organization and the priorities of your organization. The best to describe a board chair is the CEO’s schedule is a strategy, as much a strategy as any part of the strategic plan.

Show me how the CEO who is spending his time and I’ll tell you what matters most in this organization. If it’s not working, I could probably tell you why. I don’t have the confidence to look at somebody’s schedule like it’s a magic ball. I do think what you’re describing there is setting up the work of your organization in such a way as to keep you moving forward through the week and give you the energy and flexibility to respond in a 24/7 service environment. That’s an important note for our readers.

You touched on a good piece there as well. It’s also about creating space for those strategic priorities. Every now and again, this happens, something that was actually quite important that I hadn’t been intentional about enough. It was good to name that because it was something that was important for the organization. I chose to be more intentional about that. This is something that can’t continue to slide. We need to acknowledge, “Yes, it is important. We have to prioritize that.”

How we did that was to make sure that we booked things in, that we prioritized the work and there’s often work to be done around meetings. That’s the thing I don’t talk about enough in the day-to-day, that strategic plan or those strategic priorities for an organization. You got to keep those in mind because there’s a lot of noise and a lot of distractions and a lot of other things that require attention. As CEO, it’s one piece that you probably need to keep grounded around.

No one argues with you that you should be dealing with the issues that are urgent and important. That’s where everyone can see the work of the CEO and of the leadership team. Those things that people are nodding, “We’ve got to figure this out. We had this issue. We’ve got to resolve it with the government. We’ve got to resolve relative to our services or the working arrangement we have with our frontline staff.”

Everyone acknowledges urgent and important. Where I see leaders adding the most value to their organization and contributing to their own longevity as leaders of those organizations are spending time in that important, not necessarily urgent category that you’re describing there. No one knows that’s what you’re doing as a CEO and that’s what you’re spending your time on, but you know that if you don’t spend time on it, it’s going to slide.

It’s not going to become a priority. Those are important things that maybe your whole team or your board doesn’t necessarily see won’t get done. We’ve been working around the edges of the board. One of the things that many of our readers may not be aware of is there’s more than one board at Coast. Could you tell us a little bit about the Coast governance family?

I thought I was somewhat aware of this coming in, but it’s another thing to experience. We have the legal entity of which I’m CEO, which is Coast Foundation Society. Most people know us as Coast Mental Health, but there is also a separate foundation, the Coast Mental Health Foundation and the Coast Mental Health and the Coast Social Enterprise Foundation. All interact. Even though we have separate leadership for the foundation and they have a separate board, we are tied by mission and mandate.

Quite frankly, even from a resourcing perspective, one serves the work of the other. A classic example is the amazing work done by the team around the Courage to Come Back Awards. That’s all in service of raising important funds and awareness for the organization to flow directly back into programs. It’s such vital work that we’ve never been able to benefit that way from having such an internal relationship to raise the sum of money that flows straight back into programs and helps us do the work that we do. That’s an important piece in the relationship.

The social enterprise is another great and interesting piece that’s around most of our employment programs and community services. We have Social Crust Café. We have a temporary employment program. These are initiatives that were largely supported philanthropically through the foundation, and in many ways, we’re incubated to get up and running.

It’s often pieces of work that we either identify that is not a government priority, so we need some way to be able to advance that work to be able to demonstrate the success and value of that work and having these three components when they can come together and lift up the whole body of work. It’s such a unique advantage for the organization, but it also takes work from a governance perspective to keep all of those pieces aligned and working to support one another.

When everyone can come together and lift the whole body of work, it's a unique advantage for the organization, but it also takes work from a governance perspective to keep the pieces aligned. Click To Tweet

What you’re giving is some insight into the complexity of the organization that you lead and the family of organizations there. You mentioned a little bit earlier what it was like to step in to take over from a leader who’d been with the organization for 35 years. What is that like as someone who is coming in as the breath of fresh air, the new chapter, you step into the role and you’ve got this tremendous legacy that you’re taking over from? How did you approach that transition and what was it like in your first couple of months?

It’s something you’re aware of and going through the process even to apply for the role like Darrell Burnham, who I replaced. He has had such a legacy, not just for the organization but for community mental health. He’s been a trailblazer. What I had to quickly sum up is I’m not Darrell. I can’t be Darrell. As much as I might be from a role replacing Darrell, they’re not shoes that I can walk in. They’re not shoes I can fill.

I respect the legacy and the impact and the work and honor that. How I tried to set about it was is try not to feel overwhelmed by replacing someone who has done so much. We’re fortunate that Darrell reached out and we connected prior to starting the work and we both live in Port Moody. It was great to grab a coffee.

I had a couple of those opportunities, and we had a great transition. He stepped out of day-to-day, but he still lived in the community. He was still working with me to support my transition. I’m so grateful and I appreciate how well that process went. I hope it went well for Darrell as well because we wanted to honor him and his legacy, but he was such a support.

It was such a great process to have someone as you’re confronting those issues on the first few months to have the CEO call and tell me about this or have that support network. We build a friendship through that and we continue to connect now. It’s not easy. I’m not going to sugarcoat it. It’s a big thing to step in after someone with such longevity and impact.

It’s a mindset as well and trying to understand and recognize you are here for you. It’s not Darrell 2.0. You’ve got to find your own path as well. That’s the journey I’ve been on through my first year. I was trying to get to know the organization, and trying to understand it. I’ve heard a lot of, “We’ve done it this way.” I don’t have a shortcut to understanding things. I’ve had to go through a process to understand the organization and how things work. I think the staff have felt that as well. I’ve asked a few more questions and they haven’t had that for such a long time. It’s an ongoing learning process, but something that’s taken me the best part of twelve months to get a grip on the organization.

In a previous conversation, I heard you refer to that as you reassuring people. You’re asking not because you don’t trust them or you don’t think they know the answer but because you’re seeking to understand.

There’s a lot of moving pieces. Coast is a large organization. As we touched on from a governance perspective, there are a lot of elements and moving pieces and a lot of history. It takes me a minute sometimes to understand like, “I need a little bit more information on that.” It does help me give a little bit of context. It’s as much an investment from staff in a CEO’s onboarding as anyone because of those conversations and spending the time. I found this where I was able to have some good robust conversation and understand things.

I could quickly move on. It was the things I felt like I understood or I got the answer and they lingered. You linger, not letting go of things as you’re trying to figure out where you need to put your priorities and your focus. I appreciated the time that was invested from the team to help me get up to speed as much as anything despite the fact that this was stuff that they knew day-to-day. As I say, it was as much an investment in my success in onboarding as anything.

You mentioned your leadership team playing a vital role in your onboarding and the climatizing of the organization. How has the process been over the course of your first year, from showing you where things were and how things work to shifting their attention to looking to you for that leadership on what’s coming next for Coast?

I felt that as well. This has been part of the challenge for the organization because there are things that come along every day and opportunities and things like that. We’re in a process where we’re between strategic plans. I don’t have all the answers where you talk about where you’re going. That’s a process we’re going to go through. I’m excited to have that journey upon us now where we’re looking to the future and figuring out well what are those priorities for the organization.

That’s been, honestly, one of the challenges because I know staff are looking to me and the leadership team, especially after 35 years with Darryl. What’s going to be the same and what’s going to be different? I’ve tried not to get too far ahead of myself or to be putting the cart before the horse. I’m aware of identifying some opportunities, and there have been some themes that I inherited.

There are always some pieces from a previous plan that might not have been squared away, but it’s tough. My response has been that it’s a journey for all of us to go through, and it’s something we’re embarking on now. Hopefully, we’ll have a few more of those answers around what the future for Coast looks like, those priorities, and how that translates to the ground and those operational plans.

Coming into the role, you had a great deal of credibility given your track record and the work you’ve done before joining Coast, specifically in housing, recovery, and mental health. What initially pulled you toward this work? Has that motivation changed over the years?

For a long time, I’ve been very motivated from a social justice perspective. I still remember on the school grounds, even things like inequality, I would see it. It would frustrate me and I would call it out. Those things fed some of the work and the background. Part of my studies was around international or human rights, these kind of things. I didn’t find myself practicing that trade so early. As my professional career developed, I have been more fortunate to be involved in purpose-driven work and working with some great organizations that impact those areas.

In many ways, they’ve all built on the others that look very much at homelessness and then housing, which focuses more on the health side of the drug poisoning crisis. You onboarded the year that the public health emergency was declared. Suddenly, we were getting very much into issues around the toxic drug supply and supervised consumption sites. Joining an organization like Phoenix, which was very recovery-based and substance use services, those are the core pieces.

Now Coast, with mental health being at the forefront, they’ve all rounded out each other because what I’ve come to find at Coast and why I’m so excited to be at Coast is mental illness is so often associated with some of these other pieces. It’s very hard these days to find someone who’s unhoused for any length of time and who is either not suffering from substance use disorder or mental illness. The same thing around people who use drugs. There is often a reason behind that, whether it’s folks who are self-medicating or past trauma pain. There is so much complexity around these topics, not to reduce it. Mental illness is another one. Substance use is often correlated to mask the symptoms that people experience around that.

By the time I get to Coast, I’m fortunate to have built expertise in some different areas and come into an organization where I’m so fortunate to be surrounded by such subject matter experts. In the early days, I was learning. Even coming to Coast, we operate a lot of community mental health and licensed mental health services. I hadn’t done a lot of that. It’s always a question of how you dive in, learn, and understand where are things similar but also different. I consume information a lot. I speak to a lot of people. That helps me better understand the work we do and some of what we’re doing. It validates some of what we’re doing already, but also what we might need to do.

I’m so grateful to people internally, but I’m so fortunate to have such an amazing sector of leaders that we have that’s so gracious with their time and support. I don’t think we talk enough about that. You often hear this talk about organizations being combative with one another and competing for funding. It’s not my experience. I’m fortunate to work for a larger organization, but it’s my experience that people are so gracious with their time and, quite frankly, even their ideas and supporting one another.

People are so gracious with their time and ideas to support one another. Click To Tweet

In your answer there, Keir, you demonstrated what is an essential element for leaders in the social profit sector, which is curiosity. You are curious about the people you serve, the people who deliver the programs, the systems that lock people into some challenging patterns, and trying to change those systems for the betterment of those people.

You are curious about how the sector works and how other organizations work. Being prepared to ask a question and be open to learning is a way that I see as the most important trait in leaders in our sector. Every part of your answer to what motivates you was an emphasis or underlining the curiosity that you bring to the job on a daily basis. That’s impressive.

It’s very true. It’s daily. Daily, I’m stumped by something. Maybe it’s getting more confident or confident enough in your own skin. Early on as a leader, it’s nice to have all the answers, although I still like to think of myself as a young leader but been around a little bit longer, but naming what you don’t know cuts through so much more. When you can actually say, “Can you tell me more about that? I don’t quite understand that,” it’s because there are such experts and people who understand things. It’s almost daily that we come across these things where it’s mind blank, “What is that? Help me out,” whether it’s an acronym, content, or even understanding. You can even sometimes understand an issue, but you don’t always understand how it’s showing up either for us at Coast or for someone else.

What do you remember about the first few weeks on the job? Is there anything from that time that you wish you knew then that you know now?

I like to think that I was trying to be slow when I came in. It was overwhelming. As much as I tried to prepare myself that it was a large organization and to take it slow, I still find myself nearly a year in where we’ve got over 50 locations. I’m probably two-thirds of the way through. There’s still so much I don’t know and I will always feel that way a little bit. The biggest learning was I tried to come in and listen, but there was also stuff that was through transition.

Even Darrell was respectful of there were a number of decisions that were delayed and deferred, not wanting to commit the organization too much into the future to certain things. I found myself in some ways having to be involved in policy-supporting decisions but also in your first board meetings and things like that. I remember the feeling of how much I don’t know and how disconcerting that is at times and sometimes the pressure I put on myself to get through that phase as quickly as possible. I try and have more answers and a better understanding. One of the other biggest learnings I had was I tried to slow down. I tried not to rush things. My advice to myself would be to do it again by 50%.

When you’re replacing a leader of that tenure, the organization has grown, but change is something that people experience differently. I’m someone who’s probably a little bit too comfortable with change, and the smallest things can be big things for people. It’s a big learning lesson about knowing your audience. It’s being intentional and mindful of the pace you’re growing about things, how you’re showing up, and being experienced by others. If you’re going to try to be slow, slow it down a little bit further as well.

It is the old adage that slow is quick and quick is slow and go slower. That is not the advice that you get if you try to become a leader by reading what’s on LinkedIn.

No, because everyone talks about these big plans.

Be a tiger, be a lion, or whatever animal is this month. It’s refreshing to hear you reflect on your first year to maybe even a little bit slower next time.

How do you expect to make decisions quickly and decisively when you don’t fully understand? I hear about this a lot in the corporate world and things like that. I’ve also heard about it a little bit in nonprofits. Every organization is different. I did not come in under a crisis situation. To be fair, we have a very stable established organization and long-term leadership. The worst thing I can do is come in and make a whole bunch of changes.

I am grateful for that stability, but there was an opportunity still in that stability and things having been the same way for so long. It was like, “There’s going to be change.” The opportunity was to figure out how to approach that and what those most impactful pieces were. As we got through it was a few structural opportunities and things like that to set in terms of we’re now at the strategic planning place. I’m excited to do some of that work and excited to do some of that work with you as well.

As you come to the end of your first year, Keir, what are you looking forward to?

So much. I’ve found my feet, finally. It can be a grind, and not that it’s going to change. I’m excited to get into this planning work now because there’s no doubt there are any number of opportunities and needs. It’s trying to crystallize now the focus for Coast and its priorities. We can add value to the sector and help individuals where can we focus that work so that we’re doing that the best we can.

I love that process. I enjoy going through these planning processes because there’s never going to be a point in time where straight after strategic planning or when you’ve got this new plan where you feel connected and you feel aligned if you’ve done the process properly. It’s also now the combination of a lot of thoughts, ideas, and feedback I’ve heard. How does that all come together from both the input from the board and the staff teams and the client service provision perspective as well? We’ve done a lot of listening exercises. I’m excited now to be at a place where we have some answers around where we’re supposed to go. I’m looking forward to that work.

There’s a lot to look forward to in your answer to that question. Before you go, could you tell our audience where they can learn more about Coast Mental Health?

The best place is probably CoastMentalHealth.com. We have a whole range of program information. Also, our latest annual report is now available on the website. We also have our social channels, whether that’s Facebook, X, and LinkedIn. We’re on all the social channels. The foundation produces some great impact reports and things like that. We’re always looking for volunteers as well. It’s not just about learning but the work we do. The more we can spread the word around available programs and services, but also people willing to help out, show up, volunteer, and those kinds of things, there are always opportunities available.

That’s great. I’m so pleased to have you on the show. It has been a real pleasure getting to see you in action as a leader. I can attest to all of our readers that you are as thoughtful and considerate as you came across in our interview on a day-to-day basis. We can all look forward to great things from Coast in the coming months and years. Thanks for being on the show.

Thanks so much for the conversation.

Important Links

• Coast Mental Health
• Facebook – Coast Mental Health
• X – Coast Mental Health
• LinkedIn – Coast Mental Health