Jaime Allen Helps Build a Complete Picture at Community Medical Centers

When Jaime Allen reflects on her journey to becoming a successful financial executive in healthcare, she’s brought back to the way her unconventional path started.

“I feel like I did everything backwards,” Allen says. “I married young, had kids young, and then started my first real job as a bookkeeper at an auto dealership.”

That real-world experience is what inspired her to continue her education at a local community college before transferring to a four-year university for her bachelor’s in math. While an unexpected pregnancy kept her from completing her degree at that time, that moment didn’t stop Allen from cutting her teeth as a cost accountant, controller, and financial services manager in the construction and healthcare industries—experiences she credits to mentors and sponsors who believed in her.

In 2017, she came to Community Medical Centers (CMC), a nonprofit network of neighborhood health centers serving the San Joaquin and Solano counties in California. With her deep and extensive finance and accounting expertise, Allen brought an important perspective.

“We have so many traditional views of who’s qualified to do what, and a lot of it is based on your education background,” she says. “But I learned a lot through years of work and just taking on different experiences. As a leader, I feel like I have a chance to give those kinds of opportunities to other people to help them reach their goals. I had so many people inspire me and encourage me along my path, and that’s what I want to do, too.”

That mindset has been her focus ever since. Although the chief financial officer is responsible for the organization’s revenue cycle and finance functions, Allen’s commitment to her team has been equally important. She places an emphasis on coaching them to be leaders and sets an example with a servant leadership style, which requires “a respect for what others bring to the table,” she says.

“I don’t feel like I’m above anyone, that there’s a hierarchy, or like I’m more important. I tell my team that we’re all a piece of this big puzzle and it takes all of us to build the complete picture,” Allen says. “This person or that person may be the corners, but if you don’t have the rest of the pieces, it doesn’t work. I have people who know how to do things that I can’t, and I try to make sure they know that they are valued, heard, and that they matter.”

For Allen, that perspective has broad implications. While her team isn’t patient-facing, they support the people who are. The more they approach their work with a mission-driven mindset, the more effective the organization is at meeting community needs. With that formula at the center of Allen’s philosophy, she has focused on helping the finance department evolve the way it contributes. Under her leadership, the department has invested in automation, analytics, and cutting-edge technology.

“When I first came to CMC, there were binders and paper everywhere. We also didn’t have a financial analyst, we used Excel spreadsheets to present data, and we weren’t really analyzing as best as we could. But I think it’s extremely important to invest in things like analytics and automation and to make sure you have a team to help you get good data. Good data drives good decisions,” Allen says.

In 2023, she and her colleagues proved that point. Like many organizations, CMC started the year facing several challenges including inflation, rising costs, and the Great Resignation. To tackle that difficult environment, Allen and her colleagues took several steps to create a more sustainable business.

The team started by creating visibility to a key four-pronged financial approach that included a focus on quality to increase both incentives and productivity in order to increase revenue and cost control. They reviewed hours of invoices, conducted contract renegotiations, and leaned on analytics tools to create a productivity dashboard for each of the organization’s providers. As a result, CMC closed out the year stronger than it began.

For Allen, successes like that project underscore how special it is to be a part of the organization.

“When people are interviewing or just starting to work at CMC, I tell them that I hope they feel what I’ve felt coming here: complete joy and happiness,” she says. “The people I work with inspire me, and I’m thankful to be part of that. I couldn’t do what our doctors, nurses, or medical assistants do, but I’m thankful to support them.”