About our Presenters: 

Julie Apold, PhD, Vice President of Quality & Performance Excellence: 

As Vice President of Quality & Performance Excellence at LeadingAge Minnesota, Julie develops effective strategies to support aging services provider members in implementing and hardwiring quality improvement, safety, and performance excellence processes and systems. Julie created and manages LeadingAge Minnesota’s

Performance Excellence in Aging Services, Safe Care and Quality Specialist Certificate programs and serves as lead staff for the Quality Committee. Julie has deep roots in quality, safety, and performance improvement with more than 20 years of experience in healthcare safety and quality across the continuum of care. Julie holds a PhD in Human Factors and Ergonomics from the University of Minnesota.

Jess Roberts, Founder and Lead, ByDesign, LLC., St. Paul:

Jess Roberts leads BY DESIGN LLC. In this role, Mr. Roberts offers equitable co-design expertise, guidance, applied learning, and on-going support to healthcare organizations, government agencies, non-profits, and communities looking for new ways to approach persistent and complex problems, with an emphasis on creating shared power structures.

Since founding ByDesign in 2017, Mr. Roberts has been a highly sought-after partner for organizations and government agencies that are striving to improve health, wellbeing, and address inequalities through design and innovation. He is a national leader in leveraging co-design and Human Centered Design to innovate, train, and address issues of inequality and health. Mr. Roberts is an Adjunct Faculty member at the University of Minnesota, School of Public Health where he leads the development and delivery of cross-disciplinary HCD and co-design curriculum and is an affiliated researcher with the Minnesota Design Center at the University of Minnesota.