Ekta Punwani is the Leader of the 100 Top Program at IBM Watson Health. She is a trusted advisor to client executives on performance improvement opportunities and strategies based on the 100 Top Program studies.

Prior to joining IBM Watson Health, Ms. Punwani served as a Hospital and Health System executive leading organizational transformation, operations improvement, and change leadership within the health care continuum. She has demonstrated building performance improvement and analytics capability within multiple healthcare organizations including Adventist Midwest Health, Advocate Health Care and Northwestern Medicine.

Ekta provides leadership, direction, and guidance to health care organization in the areas of quality and patient safety, operations, business intelligence, and performance improvement to drive best practice implementation and achieve outcomes. She has served on the Board of Examiners for the National Baldrige Performance Excellence Program for four years and has received certification as an ICBB – International Certified Black Belt. Ekta also served as a member of the NQF Measure Feedback Loop Committee.

Ekta received both a Bachelor of Science and a Bachelor of Arts degree from University of Illinois in Champaign-Urbana and a Master’s degree in Health Administration from Washington University in St. Louis.