Managing Director, Environment Leaders Fellowship and Senior Advisor, Aspen Philanthropy and Society
Crystal Hayling is the managing director for the Environment Leaders Fellowship and senior advisor to the Aspen Philanthropy and Society Program. She joins the Aspen Institute after six years in Asia, where she advised families and foundations on strategic philanthropy to tackle the region’s most pressing social challenges. Prior to her work in Asia, Crystal was CEO of the Blue Shield of California Foundation. At BSCF she directed over $100M in strategic grants focused on universal healthcare, technology efficacy and how social media can change individual behavior for good. She also created Clinic Leadership Institute to turn top talent into robust senior managers at community health clinics. Along with a focus on leadership, Crystal has experience scaling high-impact programs. She led the team that created the first on-line Medi-Cal application which reduced approval time from months to days and she was part of the start-up teams that launched three $1 billion foundations: the California Wellness Foundation, the California HealthCare Foundation, and the Marguerite Casey Foundation. Crystal has served on national and international boards and is currently on the board of the Center for Effective Philanthropy. She has won numerous awards and for three years running was named one of the Most Influential Women in Business by the San Francisco Business Times. Crystal is a graduate of Yale University and Stanford’s Graduate School of Business. She is a 2007 Henry Crown Fellow of the Aspen Institute and a member of the Aspen Global Leadership Network.