The Future Leaders Awards program is brought to you by Behavioral Health Business, a WTWH Media health care brand. The program is designed to recognize up-and-coming industry members who are shaping the next decade of behavioral health, home health, hospice, senior housing and skilled nursing care. To see this year’s Future Leaders, visit https://futureleaders.agingmedia.com/.

Claire Ellis, national director of clinical training and development for Acorn Heath, has been named a 2024 Future Leader by Behavioral Health Business.

To become a Future Leader, an individual is nominated by their peers. The candidate must be a high-performing employee who is 40-years-old or younger, a passionate worker who knows how to put vision into action, and an advocate for those in need of behavioral health services, along with the committed professionals who work across this important corner of healthcare.

Claire Ellis runs clinical training and development for Acorn Health, an autism therapy provider that focuses on applied behavior analysis (ABA) treatment methods. Acorn operates in Florida, Illinois, Maryland, Michigan, Pennsylvania, Tennessee and Virginia.

Ellis is a certified behavior analyst who has been at Coral Gables, Florida-headquartered Acorn since 2021. She discussed with BHB her early entry to the behavioral health industry, and the approach both clinicians and company leaders should take to sustain success. The interview has been edited for length and clarity purposes.

BHB: What drew you to this industry?

Elllis: I have always been a helper by nature. I’ve been in this industry a long time. I started providing direct care behavior services since I was 19 years old.

I think what really flipped for me was that I can recognize that we can cause meaningful change that maintains over time, and we have the data to prove it. Applied behavior analysis is very data-based.

When you can see it in the child and see it in the data over a really long period of time, we can be really proud of the impact we made.

So I feel that what drew me to this industry is probably the mix of scientific approach to behavior change and the ability to see it manifest in all aspects of someone’s life, including the impact on the families of the clients that we serve.

What is the biggest lesson learned since starting to work in this industry?

Probably the true importance of individualized care and approaching each person that we have the privilege of working with in a holistic way that looks at the cultural implications.

If you could change one thing with an eye towards the future of behavioral health care, what would that be?

Increased access. We have many families that are waiting in the wings for quality providers to help them navigate through their diagnosis and how it manifests in their life.

And it’s haunting to know that there are people that can’t access care.

What do you foresee as being different about the behavioral health industry looking ahead to 2025?

I hope to see the leverage of AI and how it can help clinicians be more effective and be more efficient to serve more families.

In a word, how would you describe the future of behavioral health?

Hopeful.

I chose hopeful because of the huge push of compassionate approaches to engage with our client population and ensuring that we are individually addressing each one of our clients.

And I’m hopeful that we will draw more people to the applied behavior analysis industry, ensuring that we continue to build our population of quality providers.

What qualities must all Future Leaders possess?

I think it has to be empathy. If we can create more leaders that have the ability to build strong relationships, inspire trust and create environments where people feel valued and motivated to contribute their best work, that will bring us to a place where we have more high-quality providers and more clients will receive the care that they deserve.

And I don’t think you can do that without empathy, because that’s how you take care of the people who are doing the work.

If you could give advice to yourself looking back to your first day in the industry, what would it be and why?

Be relentless in the pursuit of excellence. If there’s something you don’t know, find out who knows it and go learn from them.

And be comfortable with not knowing and recognizing that you have to seek that information faster rather than wait. We weren’t meant to do it alone.

To learn more about the Future Leaders program, visit: https://futureleaders.agingmedia.com/.