Chutes & Ladders—Hinge Health nabs former Livongo, Google execs

Welcome to this week's Chutes & Ladders, our roundup of hirings, firings and retirings throughout the industry. Please submit the good news—or the bad—from your shop, and we will feature it here at the end of each week.


Hinge Health

Jim Pursley (Hinge)​​​​

Jim Pursley was named president of Hinge Health as part of a slew of new executive leadership changes announced by the company this week. Pursley has been a longtime adviser to Hinge, a digital musculoskeletal clinic.

Lex Annison (Hinge)

Pursley most recently served as chief commercial officer for Livongo Health. He was part of the founding executive team that grew the consumer-focused chronic condition management company to help take it public in 2019, which culminated in an $18.5 billion acquisition by Teladoc Health in 2020.

Hinge also announced Lex Annison as chief operating officer and Ron Will as chief financial officer.

Annison was most recently global director of strategy and operations at Google. He also previously held senior leadership roles at Facebook and Wish, where he helped the company grow from small early-stage startups to large, successful public companies, officials said in an announcement. Annison holds a bachelor's degree in Political Science from BYU and an MBA from Duke University’s Fuqua School of Business. 

Ron Will (Hinge)

Will brings more than 30 years of experience as a senior financial executive and investment banker, officials said, including serving as CFO of Ripple and TubeMogul, which led to their acquisition by Adobe. He also formerly served as CFO, CCO and operating partner at the growth equity firm Mainsail Partners and was CFO at BrightRoll until it was acquired by Yahoo!. Will has an MBA from the Tuck School at Dartmouth College where he was an Amos Tuck Scholar and also has a bachelor’s degree from the University of Michigan.


Home Centered Care Institute

Julie Sacks (HCCI)

Julie Sacks was named president and COO of the Home Centered Care Institute (HCCI) from her previous role. As president, Sacks will take on an expanded role in evaluating strategic opportunities and partnerships, developing relationships with donors and foundations and serving as spokesperson for the organization, officials said in a statement.

Sacks joined HCCI in 2015 as vice president of operations and advancement. Prior to joining HCCI, Sacks was senior director of programs and services and director of the National Young Onset Center for the American Parkinson Disease Association. She graduated with a bachelor’s degree in advertising from the University of Texas at Austin. After working in marketing for almost 10 years, she earned a master’s degree in social work from the University of Texas at Arlington.


Nurx

Jennifer Peña, M.D.
(Nurx)

Jennifer Peña, M.D., was named chief medical officer of Nurx, a telehealth platform providing convenient and affordable care for female health needs.

Peña will be responsible for building on Nurx growth, including expanding into new conditions.

Peña is an internal medicine doctor, Army veteran and a former physician to the White House Medical Unit. Peña joins Nurx from Oscar, where she served as medical director for virtual primary care and the INOVA VIP 360 executive medical practice. 

As an Army physician, Peña served a tour of duty at the White House Medical Unit under both the Obama and Trump administrations, running a clinic in the Eisenhower Executive Office Building, acting as medical director at Camp David, and serving as physician to the vice president. Peña’s Army experience also included tours of duty as medical director at Fort Belvoir Community Hospital and a deployment to Afghanistan in 2012.

Peña received her undergraduate degree from Yale University and her medical degree at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine before entering active duty in the US Army in 2008 and completing an internal medicine residency at Walter Reed Army Medical Center.


> Lisa Knowles was named senior director of client solutions at Harmony Healthcare, a population health and reimbursement consultancy. 

Welltok announced that Matt Hibbard joined the company as chief financial officer. 

> LifeStance Health announced the appointment of former TPG executive Felicia Gorcyca as its first chief people officer.

> Alignment Healthcare, a Medicare Advantage insurance company, announced the appointments of Rich Powers as senior vice president of business development; Rob Scavo as chief information officer; Chris Schmaltz as chief operations officer; and Rajesh Shrestha as president as new markets and chief business officer.