DANA WESTON GRAVES

Dana Weston Graves will never forget a meeting she had with a vendor who came in and started shaking hands and speaking to a man in the room whom he assumed was the hospital’s president.

“It never occurred to him that the one woman in the room could be the hospital president,” Graves says.

While this experience served as a stark reminder that people still inherently assume men to be leaders, Graves says it’s been refreshing to see — particularly during the past 15 years — more and more women at the helm of hospitals and health systems.

“I’m very grateful to my incredible parents who allowed me to be a messy little girl, which gave me the courage and resiliency that’s required in leadership,” she says. In her community, Graves also serves on the board of YMCA of South Hampton Roads and has been involved with United Way of South Hampton Roads.

She has also been recognized multiple times on Becker’s Hospital Review’s annual list of women hospital presidents and CEOs to know. But recognition for Graves feels “strange,” she says, because she feels she’s doing exactly what she’s supposed to be doing every day.

But “the opportunity to be recognized as a strong African American leader or strong woman leader is meaningful, because it allows someone else to see themselves reflected in leadership.”

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