Q&A with Leslie McCarley, President & CEO of Women’s College Hospital Foundation

1. What inspired you to join Women’s College Hospital Foundation? 

I was inspired to join Women’s College Hospital Foundation because women are still under-represented, underserved, and under-researched in healthcare. Sex and gender disparities haven’t budged—women are still more likely to die from things we know how to prevent. We need to move the dial on research, practices, and potential policy in order to change the way women experience healthcare across Canada and ultimately around the globe.  

2. What excites you the most about working with — and in support of — our donor community? 

For the bulk of my career, I have worked with people who have the ability to make important things happen and connected them with people who do important things. 

Women’s College Hospital is an N of 1, a clinical trial wherein a single data point is the basis of the entire trial—the hospital is the focus, and we are the ones revolutionizing and changing the way healthcare is delivered and received. We are unique and have a huge impact.  

In being here, I am so excited to work with donors to help leverage this great work. Transformational funding is important—and can be truly astonishing. Working with the hospital, board, and team, I’d like to help facilitate that.  

3. How does Women’s College Hospital’s history of innovation inspire and motivate you in your role? 

When I think of innovation, I think of imagination—which to me, is the most important trait that one can have. Imagination stimulates progress, and I’m excited to build on the creativity and audacity that is part of the hospital’s DNA in order to create new strategies that will bring us into the future of healthcare. 

4. Women’s College Hospital Foundation has just launched our “We See Things Differently” campaign which coincides with WCH’s 140th anniversary. What are the unique ways you think WCH sees things differently? 

The best things in life are not “things,”—but ways of living; having health, opportunities and community. Women’s College Hospital has that in spades—when we talk here about health, it isn’t just about providing a number of beds or completing a number of procedures—but about seeing potential solutions differently and therefore achieving better results. 

5. What are you most looking forward to accomplishing in your new role? 

Real transformation. Which I know, doesn’t happen overnight. But real transformation that puts a laser focus on creating impact within the hospital and for our donors. That’s what I hope to accomplish.  

6. How do you feel in your new role as President and CEO of Women’s College Hospital Foundation? 

That one’s simple: Ready!