When I joined NMDP as chief financial officer in 2013, I wasn’t just in the middle of a great professional change, but also a very personal battle — I was undergoing chemotherapy for breast cancer.
I’ll be honest, I was scared. I worried not just about my health, but about whether I could truly show up for my team and lead the way I aspired to, knowing a global nonprofit landscape would test me in new ways. In those vulnerable moments, a question echoed in my mind: What do I want to do with this one precious life? The answer was clear. I wasn’t just accepting a job, I was committing to shepherd a mission that saves patient lives every single day. And there was nothing I wanted more than to be part of something so meaningful.
Fast forward to today, that sense of purpose I found 12 years ago — my “why” — remains an internal compass guiding me, especially when uncertainty threatens to cloud our ambitious path forward.
Making purpose personal
At NMDP, our purpose is as personal as it is urgent – connecting patients to lifesaving cell therapies. It’s about helping people like 4-year-old Noelle and her 2-year-old brother Lucca. Both have a very rare, life-threatening blood disease and urgently need blood stem cell transplants to survive. Lucca has several potential donors on the NMDP Registry, but Noelle does not have any suitable matches among the more than 42 million donors accessible internationally through NMDP.
This family is one of thousands that relies on NMDP annually to help raise awareness and drive more donors to register so these young children have a chance to survive and thrive.
Each year, over 18,000 patients are diagnosed with blood cancers and disorders for which a blood stem cell transplant from a related or unrelated donor may be their best hope for a cure. These patients and their families – as well as the healthcare professionals that treat them at U.S. transplant centers – rely on our donor registry, research, and financial support grants to live. It doesn’t get more real than that.
Where metrics meet mission
On the surface, running a nonprofit is not so different from operating any other business—we have a bottom line, we’re responsible for tough decisions, and every dollar matters. But knowing that each dollar could literally save someone’s life? That reframes how you think about every choice you make as a leader.
I’m thankful for an exceptional leadership team, who share this mindset and how it sharpens our focus, sometimes painfully, on where our impact will be greatest. Often, that means we have to say “no” to something worthwhile, simply because we know we can impact more patients elsewhere.
This is where our mission and metrics collide. It stretches our leaders and employees to get comfortable being uncomfortable. And it stretches my ability to lead. Yet when we celebrate five consecutive record-breaking quarters for the number of transplants NMDP facilitated, like we did recently, it’s clear the efforts are worth it. We are advancing our mission and aligning our impact in service of patients.
Leading with authenticity
As leaders in this space, staying grounded in your “why” does more than focus your decision making — it sets an example for your entire organization. When you’re empowered to lead with purpose, others will follow you.
Still, every leader knows that getting people engaged in their organization’s mission and keeping them engaged requires a steadfast commitment from those employees. .s. And earning that commitment begins with authentic leadership.
In my experience, I’ve found that showing up as yourself is the best way to inspire people. It takes strength and courage, two qualities that people expect from a leader. But it also requires something leaders may feel inclined to hide – vulnerability.
I’m comfortably uncomfortable sharing with my employees that I’ve made mistakes, questioned my worth, and had to push through fear at times. They can then see that I’m just as human as they are and hopefully inspires them to charge through their own challenges for the benefit of patients
It helps to remember the bigger picture of our organizational mission. Every day at NMDP, for instance, we work with patients and families who are navigating extremely emotional terrain as they receive a diagnosis, search for a donor, and undergo a blood stem cell transplant.
My decade-plus of nonprofit healthcare leadership has taught me that a unique blend of talents is required. You need the expertise to balance financial and operational excellence with a servant-leader mentality. A tenacious capacity for continuous improvement comes with the territory. What keeps that in check? For me, it’s a personal leadership ethos around kindness, graciousness and a deep well of empathy.
Leading with a legacy mindset
Nonprofit leadership isn’t about having all the answers.. It’s about grounding your teams and your organization in their own “why,” so they can trust and rely on our unshakeable purpose, especially in times of change. Every decision and every dollar spent must reflect our commitment.
When I reflect on what I have learned so far in my decade or so at the helm, and remember when I was at a crossroads of a personal health battle and professional change, that question remains fresh in my mind. What do I want to do with this one precious life?
This one question has brought clarity, shaping how I lead, how I engage the many people who rely on us, and how I keep my “why” at the heart of every decision. Because in the end, leadership is about bringing more good to people — and that’s a legacy worth leaving.
Amy Ronneberg
Amy Ronneberg became CEO of NMDP in March 2020. She's responsible for setting the overall strategic direction and leading an organization of over 2,100 professionals and 21,000 volunteers who are dedicated to creating a world where every patient can receive their life-saving cell therapy.
