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Her advice to young women at the beginning of their careers? Surround yourself with mentors and “sponsors,” or allies who will speak up on your behalf.
OAKLAND, Calif. — Dr. Rita Ng’s resume may be one of a kind. In her senior year at Stanford University, Ng was crowned Miss California — the first Asian American to win the title. The following year, she came in second runner-up in the Miss America pageant.
Now serving her second term as physician-in-chief for Kaiser Permanente, Ng was named cardiologist of the year in 2022 by the American College of Cardiology’s California Chapter. All of this while raising three young sons.
“It continues to be a challenge for women and underrepresented groups in medicine,” Ng told an audience of students and faculty at Northeastern University’s Oakland campus last week. “Sometimes, walking into a room, people still ask, ‘When is the doctor coming?’”
Ng, who also sits on the Board of Directors for the Kaiser Medical Group, spoke as part of the Mills Institute’s Russell Women in Science Leadership lecture series. Ng spoke about her personal journey to lead Kaiser’s Oakland Medical Center, as well as her vision for how the role of leadership in general is changing.
“Whatever your aspiration is, how do you think differently so you can achieve innovative results?” Ng said. She stressed the importance of thinking big and beyond the present reality.
“If you can’t imagine it, you can’t be it,” she said.
Ng grew up in Tracy, a small agricultural town in California’s Central Valley, the daughter of immigrant parents. Hers was one of two Asian families in town. Since high school Ng knew she wanted to go into medicine and turned down Stanford to attend an accelerated pre-med program on the East Coast. At the last minute, she changed her mind.
“My entire family was in California and I didn’t want to live in the snow,” she said. She called Stanford and they said she still had a spot in the freshman class.
A self-described introvert, Ng said that the first couple of years of college were lonely. She had friends, but it took time to stop feeling homesick. She eventually found her voice, she said, which is lucky because now her job requires so much public speaking.
“This is something you can learn to do, even if you’re shy like me,” she said. “You can learn to do it, remain authentic to yourself and be successful.”
Ng studied human biology at Stanford and completed her medical training and residency at University of California, San Francisco. She served as chief cardiology fellow at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Beverly Hills and assistant clinical professor of medicine at UCSF before joining Kaiser Permanente in 2011.
As physician-in-chief, Ng oversaw the Oakland Medical Center’s conversion into a care command center during the pandemic. From the hospital’s upper floors, she said, it was possible to see the Grand Princess cruise ship docked at the Port of Oakland. The ship was returning from Mexico when a passenger died of COVID-19 — the first death from the virus in California — and then anchored in Oakland with 3,000 people under quarantine.
At that point Ng was almost nine months pregnant with her third son, Leo. The hospital was triple-booked with patients and caregivers working around the clock. The strain from that experience, Ng said, hasn’t completely dissipated.
“A lot of health care workers are still in recovery,” she said. “The trauma is very real.”
She said that her priorities as a leader in the health care industry are threefold: ensure the safety of employees and patients, make science-based decisions and always be transparent.
“That was really inspiring,” said Northeastern business and social innovation major Numa Patel. “I like what she said about her journey, having immigrant parents and not going to her initial school.”
Other students who attended also found Ng’s story motivating. Business major Divia Gopalakrishnan appreciated hearing about Ng’s experience as a woman of color.
“Things can be different for women in leadership,” Gopalakrishnan said. “She changed the culture so it’s more inclusive for moms.”
“What she said about finding her voice, that was relatable,” added business and psychology major Nitya Goenka, 21. “It was also validating. I don’t know what I want to do, but I don’t have to be so hard on myself.”