JoAnne Finck

President, Friends of Cooley Dickinson

She Has Long Understood the Importance of Getting Involved

Photo by Focus Ashely Photos

JoAnne Finck grew up in Holyoke in what she described as “modest” surroundings. Her parents, from a young age, impressed upon her the importance of appreciating what one has and assisting those in need.

“They always taught me the value of helping,” she recalled. “One of the things that was really important was that my mother and father would always say, ‘there’s someone who has it worse, so what can you do to help?’”

All through her life, she’s been asking that question — and answering it proactively.

Indeed, throughout a career that has taken her from banking to a leadership role with an insurance company co-owned by her husband, Roger, to serving Friends of Cooley Dickinson (currently as its president), she has always gotten involved, and she has always worked to build a stronger community.

“My goal in life was to always to make a difference — in the community, and in someone’s life,” she said. “And if you can make the change for one person, then you’ve succeeded.”

She’s done just that while serving in volunteer leadership roles for local organizations ranging from the United Way of Hampshire and Franklin Counties to the UMass Fine Arts Center; from Pioneer Valley Symphony to the Greater Northampton Chamber of Commerce.

And she has especially done that in her role with Friends of Cooley Dickinson, where she has energized the organization and infused it with new members, while also leading several fundraising campaigns for CDH, now part of Mass General Brigham.

Finck chaired the Building Our Future Campaign, a comprehensive campaign that raised funds for the Mass General Cancer Center at Cooley Dickinson Hospital. She also volunteered on the Caring for the Future Campaign and was pivotal in raising funds for the Kittredge Surgery Center and an addition to the North Building.

The goal for the Building Our Future Campaign was $8.2 million, but $11.4 million was raised, in part due to Finck’s persistence, drive, and ability to communicate the importance of a strong CDH, and a modern, state-of-the-art cancer center, to Northampton and the communities that surround it.

“As a campaign volunteer, she stands out because of her unwavering enthusiasm and commitment; her grace, dedication to community, and persistency were paramount to our success,” wrote Christina Trinchero, Communications director for CDH, in nominating Finck as a Woman of Impact.

As she talked about raising money, be it for a college, a nonprofit, the United Way, or CDH — and she’s done it for all of the above — Finck said it is both art and science, and there is a key ingredient to success.

“One of the things that was really important was that my mother and father would always say, ‘there’s someone who has it worse, so what can you do to help?’”

“No one likes to ask for money, but if you believe in something, that makes it much easier,” she explained. “I don’t take every single cause — I look to how you can make a difference, how we can make a change, and if I believe in something, I will be very passionate, and I ask.”

“The hospital is a core supporter of the area; we are so lucky to have a world-class community hospital here,” she went on, adding that the merger with Mass General has taken the level of care and access to resources, specialists, and options to a new and much higher level. “Cooley will always be special to me in regards to being there for family and friends and giving our community world-class care within a community-hospital environment. Cooley makes a difference in the lives of its patients.”

She obviously knows a little about making a difference, and has essentially spent a lifetime doing what her parents impressed upon her that she needed to do — make full use of her time and talents to help others.

“Because of her expansive commitment to organizations across our community, JoAnne has made a lasting impact in a variety of areas ranging from education and healthcare to fine arts and social services,” said Trinchero, speaking for countless others when she said Finck is certainly a Woman of Impact.

Collecting Experience

Soon after graduating from Marymount College in Tarrytown, N.Y. and working briefly as a “grunt” on Wall Street, Finck returned to this region — and a tough job market — and eventually found work at Shawmut Bank in Greenfield, in its collection department.

She had a number of responsibilities, including being part of two-person teams that would repossess cars from owners who had fallen behind on their payments. And in the recession years of the early ’80s, there were plenty of cars to repossess.

JoAnne Finck and her husband, Roger, have long been strong supporters of Cooley Dickinson Hospital.

It was not glamorous work, obviously, and not something she recalls with any fondness, but it was a learning experience on many levels, and it reinforced an already-strong desire to help others.

“I got that delinquent rate from over 10% to 0.5% in less than a year,” she recalled. “And I learned that I was very good at working with people and helping them. I would try to work with them and say, ‘this is what you need to do … communicate with me, and we’ll get you on the right path.’”

She would move on the loan office, and as her banking career progressed, her desire to get involved in the community grew. She ran the Sustaining Campaign for Youth for the local YMCA in 1982, a successful initiative that would inspire involvement with the United Way of Franklin County.

“It helped children, it helped people of need, and, being the treasurer, I knew that the money raised stayed in the community, so I got very vested in the United Way,” she said, adding that she volunteered on its board for more than 20 years (including as treasurer and chair), ran leadership giving, and chaired its campaign in 1999.

“I was very vested in the United Way because I saw how it helped so many people,” she told BusinessWest. “We would have people speak to us, people who were homeless, people who had drug issues, and they talked about how this one place, the United Way, helped them. It was so impactful — for me, it was easy to raise the money. I hate asking people, but this was making a difference in people’s lives.”

“As a campaign volunteer, she stands out because of her unwavering enthusiasm and commitment; her grace, dedication to community, and persistency were paramount to our success.”

Finck also handled major gifts for Lilly Library in Florence before getting heavily involved with another institution in that area — CDH. Or more involved, to be more precise.

In the late ’80s, she would take part in phone-a-thons for the hospital’s annual giving campaigns before taking on a larger role with several of its fundraising drives, including the comprehensive Building Our Future campaign as well as the initiative for the cancer center, which started in 2008 and took eight years, largely because the hospital was in the process of being merged into a larger, still-undetermined healthcare group.

Later, she would get involved with Friends of Cooley Dickinson (formerly the hospital auxiliary), which this year is celebrating its 120th anniversary.

The group runs the hospital’s coffee and gift shops, conducts events, places art throughout the hospital (which can be purchased, with some of the proceeds going to Friends), and stages several fundraising events, including an annual Trees of Love event in the Healing Garden and an arts-and-crafts auction.

It has grown and gained new energy under Finck, who was recruited to be its president, as Trinchero explained in her nomination.

“She blends a respect for traditions and history of the auxiliary with a dynamic ability to manage change,” she wrote, “thus keeping long-standing auxilians and volunteers involved, while recruiting new members to reinvigorate the group.”

A ‘Giving’ Person

Finck’s passion for supporting CDH is in many ways personal.

JoAnne Finck has been instrumental in many of the fundraising campaigns that have reshaped Cooley Dickinson Hospital.

To explain, she turned back the clock 20 years to when she arrived home at 2 a.m. after attending an insurance event.

“All the lights were on in the house,” she said. “My husband … I thought he was having a heart attack. He was pale; he was sweating. He said, ‘I sat up, I walked, and something was definitely wrong.’”

She took him to the ER at CDH, where X-rays were taken.

“You know it’s bad when they call you back right away,” she said, adding that tests revealed a huge mass in his chest, which turned out to be the largest bronchogenic cyst that anyone involved with removing it had ever seen. Finck said those at CDH (this was pre-merger days) fast-tracked her husband to Beth Israel Hospital and its head thoracic surgeon.

“We were just average people coming in with a problem,” she said, adding that, around that time, she was doing what she called minor fundraising for the hospital. She was good friends with Mike Kittredge, the founder of Yankee Candle, who passed away several years ago, who offered to make some phone calls on her behalf. She said that wouldn’t be necessary.

“The hospital took us under their wing, shipped us to Boston, and got it squared away. He had a six-month recovery, but he’s 100%,” she went on. “We were no one special, and that’s the point — they treat everyone like that.”

Repeat evidence to this effect has inspired Finck as she has taken on the lead in fundraising campaigns and her work with Friends, both of which she finds rewarding and fulfilling.

Especially the fundraising.

As she mentioned earlier, it isn’t easy asking for money — for anything and at any time — but when the cause is good, the assignment is easier. And when it comes to the campaigns at CDH and their purposes — from the cancer center to the ER to the childbirth center — the impact on the community is enormous.

Getting back to the art and science of making the ask, and getting individuals and institutions to commit, she said it comes down to being honest, persistent, and, above all, a true believer in the cause.
“When taking on a project, you must believe in the project and then research its impact to people and the community,” she explained. “Timing is essential for the ask, as is listening to the people you are talking to. After the ask … follow up, and then even more follow-up is mandatory, but the most important part is a ‘thank you’ — regardless of the outcome.”

Finck has become quite proficient at all of this, and that’s just one of many reasons why she’s a Woman of Impact.