Kent Thiry

Kent Thiry
Former Mayor of the DaVita Village, currently an engaged citizen

Kent Thiry (KT) was CEO of DaVita from 1999 to 2019, a Fortune 250 company with 65,000 teammates across 12 countries.  He stepped down as Executive Chair in June 2020.

DaVita is known for a distinctively engaged culture and for developing well-rounded general managers and leaders.  DaVita has been the subject of leadership and culture case studies written by both Harvard and Stanford, and KT regularly speaks on these topics.

Kent made a public pledge in 2015 that DaVita would be one of the first Fortune 500 companies to have a majority diverse board, and they fulfilled that pledge in 2016.

He is significantly involved in the national US Democracy Renewal Movement and has successfully led 5 major statewide ballot initiatives in Colorado in the last 6 years.  Examples include: redistricting reform, open primaries, and fiscal reform. 

KT served on the global board of The Nature Conservancy and was Chair of the global Public Policy committee. He also founded and chairs Colorado Thrives, a group consisting primarily of large Colorado company CEOs, which is focused on advancing economic mobility and the general wellbeing of Colorado and all its citizens.  He co-founded The Aspen Group with Senators Bill Frist and Tom Daschle, a group dedicated to non-partisan healthcare reform.  He is also a founding board member of Colorado Endeavor, an international entrepreneurial network.

He is also the Founder and Chairman of AdvanceEDU, an innovative college focused on providing job competency and extensive support services to low-income students. Kent was Founding Chair of the Colorado Gap Fund and Fundraising Chair for the Climber Fund; together these two funds have raised over $80 million to help small businesses (owned by women, people of color, veterans and rural citizens) survive Covid.

Prior board seats include the Harvard Business School Advisory Board, Oxford Health Plan and Varian. Also, he has done extensive advisory work for KKR.  Kent is currently an advisor to Guild and TechStars, and sits on the board of SonderMind.

Earlier in his career, Kent served as Partner at Bain & Company.  He earned his BA in Political Science, with distinction and Phi Beta Kappa, from Stanford University.  He earned his MBA, with honors, from Harvard Business School.

Kent received the Woodrow Wilson Award for Denver Corporate Citizenship in 2013. In 2016, he received the International Bridge Builders Award from the University of Denver.  In 2020, he received the Governor’s Citizenship Medal for Growth & Innovation. KT is married to Denise O’Leary, has two children and is an enthusiastic but modestly capable mountain biker and backpacker.