Tara is a change leadership advisor, academic practitioner, and social entrepreneur who works at the intersection of trust, governance, and public engagement. As Principal of Civic Health Partners, an independent consulting practice that she founded in 2017, Tara helps purpose-driven organizations build trustworthy leadership and public engagement strategies. An EMCC-accredited coach at the Senior Practitioner level, she facilitates conversations with health executives and social impact leaders navigating complexity, change, adaptive leadership, and political challenges.
Tara’s identity as a patient and public-interest advocate was forged over 14 years in senior leadership roles at the nonprofit Consumer Reports. She helped secure millions of dollars in grant funding, led a team of researchers, journalists, and advocates to advance marketplace transparency, safety, affordability, and accountability in healthcare.
She collaborated with the ABIM Foundation to launch the public engagement effort for Choosing Wisely, a global campaign to reduce unnecessary medical care. Her team built a network of 60 partners, reaching 100 million consumers with fact-based health information.
Tara brings substantial experience in organizational governance. From 2017-2020 she served as co-chair of PatientsLikeMe’s Ethics and Compliance Advisory Board. From 2019-2024, she served on the Board of Directors of the American Board of Medical Specialties, including two years as Chair of the Public Member Caucus, and as a member of the Executive Committee. In 2026, she joined the Board of Directors of the Council of Medical Specialty Societies as a Public Member.
Tara is the recipient of the Benjamin Shimberg Public Service Award from the Institute for Credentialing Excellence, recognizing her work as a patient advocate.
Her research on trust in the U.S. leadership response to COVID-19 informs her writing and speaking on trustworthy systems leadership. Her work has appeared in JAMA, American Journal of Bioethics, Journal of Medical Internet Research, BMJ, AMA Journal of Ethics podcast, and the Oxford Handbook of Healthcare Innovation. Her insights on trustworthy data and AI have helped guide the Coalition for Health AI, Duke Health, and AHIMA.
She holds a Specialized Master’s in Consulting and Coaching for Change from HEC Paris and Saïd Business School, University of Oxford. From 2022-2025, Tara returned to Saïd Business School as Executive in Residence, bringing practitioner insights on health leadership and changemaker wellbeing to the Skoll Centre for Social Entrepreneurship.
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