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Annual Report

Healthcare Group Purchasing Industry Initiative

Click here to view the 18th Annual Report to the Public (PDF)

February 2024

Charter of the HGPII Advisory Council

Introduction

The Healthcare Group Purchasing Initiative (HGPII) is an independent and voluntary organization created to establish and assure implementation of the highest ethical standards and business conduct practices in the healthcare group purchasing industry. HGPII’s governing body is a Steering Committee comprised of the Chief Executive Officers of HGPII’s nine founding members. A Working Group, comprised of representatives of the founding member organizations, provides general supervision and management of HGPII. The HGPII Coordinator is an independent party who serves as the initiative’s chief operating officer managing its day-to-day affairs and coordinating HGPII’s Annual Best Practices Forum.

Background

In 2005, the founding members, major healthcare group purchasing organizations (GPOs), formed HGPII to adopt and implement a set of six core ethical principles of business and conduct that acknowledge and express their responsibilities to both the public as well as to the government entities that fund healthcare services in the United States. The HGPII principles establish a formal process for the industry to improve and monitor its ethical and business conduct practices through significant transparency and to sustain a high level of trust with the public. Each HGPII member pledges to follow the six core ethical and business principles, to report annually on adherence to these principles using an Annual Public Accountability Questionnaire, and to participate in the Annual Best Practices Forum to discuss best ethical and business conduct practices with other GPO representatives and interested parties.

Advisory Council Purposes

The purpose of an independent Advisory Council is to provide a source of independent advice and counsel to the Steering Committee and HGPII members in connection with developing, implementing, and managing compliance and best practices that:

  • Support the HGPII’s commitment to sustain the highest level of trust with the public; as well as
  • Promote legal compliance and high ethical standards in the GPO industry.

Advisory Council Responsibilities

The Advisory Council’s key responsibilities are to:

  • Provide counsel and advice to the Steering Committee on compliance best practices and applicable HGPII activities;
  • Participate in the annual Best Practices Forum, and other meetings or conference calls as requested by the Steering Committee; and
  • Provide assistance to the HGPII Coordinator and members (as requested) regarding best practices related to compliance programs.

Advisory Council Membership

The Advisory Council consists of at least three individuals, independent of all GPOs, and recognized for leadership in promoting ethical business conduct. The HGPII Coordinator designates the individuals as directed by the Steering Committee (with recommendations from the Working Group). Advisory Council members serve for a term as agreed by the council member. However, no member may serve for longer than four consecutive years unless an exception is made by the Steering Committee.

Selection criteria for Advisory Council membership include:

  • A demonstrated record of adhering to and supporting ethical business practices;
  • A willingness to support the HGPII’s principles;
  • A willingness to fulfill the Advisory Council’s responsibilities;
  • A knowledge of the healthcare industry; as well as
  • Being notably respected within their respective professions.

Advisory Council Conflict of Interest Procedure

Each Advisory Council member must:

  • Complete a conflict of interest questionnaire on an annual basis;
  • Confirm the member’s obligation to inform HGPII of any conflict of interest not identified on the questionnaire that may arise subsequently; and
  • Disclose in writing any business, financial, or other relationship that may create a conflict of interest or be perceived to create a conflict of interest.

The HGPII Coordinator will review each Advisory Council member’s conflict of interest questionnaire. An Advisory Council member must recuse herself or himself from any identified conflict of interest.

John Hasnas, Associate Professor of Business at the McDonough School of Business at Georgetown University

John Hasnas is a professor of business at Georgetown’s McDonough School of Business, a professor of law (by courtesy) at Georgetown University Law Center and the executive director of the Georgetown Institute for the Study of Markets and Ethics. Professor Hasnas has held previous appointments as associate professor of law at George Mason University School of Law, visiting associate professor of law at Duke University School of Law and the Washington College of Law at American University, and Law and Humanities Fellow at Temple University School of Law. Professor Hasnas has also been a visiting scholar at the Kennedy Institute of Ethics in Washington, DC and the Social Philosophy and Policy Center in Bowling Green, Ohio.
John received his B.A. in Philosophy from Lafayette College, his J.D. and Ph.D. in Legal Philosophy from Duke University, and his LL.M. in Legal Education from Temple Law School.

Anne Nobles

Anne retired in 2012 from Eli Lilly and Company, where she worked for over 22 years in a variety of senior leadership roles throughout the company. Most recently, she served as Senior Vice President for Enterprise Risk Management and Chief Ethics and Compliance Officer. While at Lilly, Anne served as vice-chair of the board of directors of the Ethics and Compliance Officers Association. In 2012, she recommended to PhRMA, the pharmaceutical industry’s trade association, that it provide a forum to discuss the industry’s compliance expectations. PhRMA did so and asked Anne to chair this first Chief Compliance Officers Working Group.

Since retirement, Anne has lectured on ethics at business schools across the country and served as a consultant on education issues. She has been a member of the Indianapolis City-County Ethics Commission since 2016, as an appointee of Mayor Joe Hogsett.

Anne has been a member of the board of directors of Indiana University Health since 2011. IU Health is a nationally recognized comprehensive health system comprised of hospitals, physicians, and allied services and a unique partnership with IU School of Medicine. From 2014-2018, Anne served as chair of the board of directors.

Since 2000, Anne has served first as a trustee and later as a director of Citizens Energy Group, a public charitable trust providing water, wastewater, natural gas, steam, and chilled water utilities to customers in Indianapolis. She has been vice-chair of the board since 2012 and was elected chair for a term beginning in January 2020.

Anne has volunteered extensively for community organizations beginning in 1991 and continuing to the present. Today, she chairs the IU Health Foundation and serves as co-chair of the Indianapolis Prize for Conservation, the largest such prize in the world. She has served as a trustee of The Indiana Chapter of The Nature Conservancy since 2013. She completed a two-year term as chair in 2019.

Anne has dedicated significant time to her church, Second Presbyterian, in Indianapolis, where she is serving a three-year term as an elder beginning in 2018. She was elected by the 3500-member congregation as one of twelve members to serve on the pastor nominating committee, which spent more than a year reviewing candidates and then selecting the senior pastor for the church. Today, she is involved in the congregation’s strategic planning efforts.

Anne graduated from Harvard College summa cum laude earning an A.M. from Harvard’s Graduate School of Arts and Sciences in Anthropology with a focus on Archaeology. She graduated from Georgetown University Law School magna cum laude and served on the Georgetown Law Journal for two years and an editor of the Journal for one year.

Anne and her husband David Johnson live in Indianapolis and have one daughter Catherine.

Jacqueline E. Brevard, Senior Advisor at GEC Risk Advisory LLC

Jacqueline E. Brevard is Senior Advisor at GEC Risk Advisory LLC, the global governance, risk, integrity, reputation and crisis advisory firm (www.GECRisk.com) serving executives, boards, investors and advisors in diverse sectors, growth stages and industries, primarily in the Americas, Europe and Africa. Client assignments range from strategic to tactical, including enterprise and specific risk assessments, crisis planning, integrity program development, codes of conduct, and customized education from the boardroom to the shop floor.

She is a Program Director for The Conference Board, a member of the Adjunct Faculty at New York University, and a member of the Faculty at the Ethics and Compliance Initiative, specializing in innovative risk management techniques. She is an Ethisphere 2009 100 Most Influential People in Business Ethics.

Ms. Brevard, the former Vice President, Chief Ethics and Compliance Officer of Merck & Co., Inc., is the pioneer and visionary who developed and successfully implemented the first comprehensive Global Ethics and Compliance Program for a top-tier global pharmaceutical company, driving Merck & Co. to a leadership position in organizational ethics and compliance and setting the standard that others would follow years later. She has more than 20 years of experience in the corporate ethics and compliance field, as Merck’s Ethics and Compliance Program and Ombudsman Program were consolidated under Ms. Brevard who reported regularly to Merck’s Executive Committee and the Board. Ms. Brevard also has more than 15 years of experience as an international transactional attorney having completed projects, during her tenure at Merck, in Latin America, Asia-Pacific, Central and Eastern Europe, the Middle East and Africa.

She is Chair of the Board of the International Business Ethics Institute, a member of the Advisory Board of the Institute for Ethical Leadership at Rutgers University, and a member of the Advisory Board of the Healthcare Group Purchasing Industry Initiative (HGPII).

Ms. Brevard has also served on the Board of Directors of the Ethics and Compliance Initiative, and is Vice Chair Emeritus of the organization. She is a Founding Fellow of the Ethics Research Center’s Fellows Program, where she served as its Chair. Ms. Brevard is a published author and a frequent speaker at many distinguished conferences and universities, including ECI conferences, Compliance Week, Practicing Law Institute, the Pharmaceutical Regulatory and Compliance Congress, the Corporate Executive Board’s CELC, Institute for Ethical Leadership at Rutgers University, NYU, Georgetown University and Columbia University.

Ms. Brevard received a J.D. from Rutgers University School of Law and an LLM in International Law from New York University School of Law.

Remembering Senator Robert Bennett

September 18, 1933–May 4, 2016

Read the Tribute to Senator Bennett