Board Member
Karen Jackson was elected to the WPS Board of Directors in 2023. She retired from the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services in March 2023 as Deputy Chief Operating Officer, having served in various senior executive positions during her tenure. In her last position at CMS, she was responsible for directing operational support for more than $1 trillion in health care spending and an annual budget of $7 billion, including information technology, human capital, physical and systems security, acquisition and risk management in an organization made up of more than 6,300 expert civil servants.
Over the course of her CMS career, Jackson was the executive lead for a variety of CMS intiatives that improved services and reduced operating costs. She led implementation of the mandate to protect Medicare beneficiaries from identity theft by issuing and mailing 62 million new Medicare cards before deadline and under budget, and testifying before Congress on status of the initiative. She led the development and implementation of the consolidation of the Medicare operational infrastructure to achieve greater consistency in Medicare claims payment and accounting operations and reducing administrative costs. Jackson also worked to build organizational capacity in CMS’s Innovation Center to support national expansion of Medicare payment models that improve health outcomes and quality and reduce health care costs.
Prior to her role as Deputy Chief Operating Officer, Jackson was a senior executive at CMS in several capacities, including serving as Deputy Director of CMS’s Center for Medicare & Medicaid Innovation, Group Director for Medicare Contractor Management and for Information Services Modernization.
Jackson is the recipient of multiple awards in recognition of her contributions, including FedHealthIT’s Leading for Impact: Women in Leadership Award, the Department of Health and Human Services Acquisition Award, and the Presidential Rank Award for sustained accomplishments.
She holds a Bachelor of Arts degree from James Madison College at Michigan State University in East Lansing, Michigan, and a Master of Public Policy degree from the Gerald Ford School of Public Policy at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, Michigan.
