Aaron Blass has spent 15+ years leading healthcare organizations through transformation, and now leads growth at one of Iowa's largest youth-serving nonprofits. Husband. Father of seven. 30-year distance runner. Optimist by discipline.
Aaron Blass is Chief Growth Officer at YSS, one of Iowa's largest youth-serving nonprofits, where he leads organizational growth, revenue strategy, and philanthropic advancement.
Previously, he was Director of Value-Based Care Transformation at DaVita, and spent over a decade as CEO of Lifepoint Dental Group, scaling it from a single practice to a multi-location enterprise. He led strategic sourcing for the State of Iowa, including $49M in emergency PPE procurement during COVID-19, and ran business operations and development at Select Medical.
He holds a B.S. in Aeronautical Science from Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University and a Public Management Certificate from Drake University. A former airline pilot, Aaron believes leadership is about integrity, accountability, and continuous improvement.
Aaron's leadership is grounded in faith, empathy, and accountability. He builds safe environments with high standards, develops strengths instead of fixing weaknesses, and gets results through alignment and trust, not pressure.
Strength is not the absence of struggle. Strength is what struggle produces when you refuse to quit. Faith anchors every hard decision.
People do their best work when they feel safe and believed in. Aaron's job is to be the water station: create the conditions where good people keep going.
Love and high standards are not opposites. Clear direction, honest feedback, and ownership at every level. The people you believe in will run farther than they thought they could.
Behind the boardroom is a full house. Aaron is a husband and the father of seven in a blended family of nine that loves to travel together and shows up for each other.
They worship at Lutheran Church of Hope (campuses in Ankeny and West Des Moines), where he and his family are longtime members. The same people-first faith that shapes his leadership starts at home. The dinner table is where he practices what he preaches: listen first, believe in people, and hold the line with love.
Ask him about work and you will hear about teams. Ask him about life and you will hear about his kids.
Seven kids, two parents, one team. Chaos, laughter, and a lot of grace.
Aaron and his wife love to travel and see the world through each other's eyes, and through their children. New places, shared stories, memories that compound.
Faith is a family practice, not a solo one. Sundays anchor the week.
We love to travel. Every trip reminds us how big and beautiful the world is, and how much better it looks when you share it with the people you love.
Before the boardroom, there was the cockpit. I started as a corporate pilot, then flew for the airlines with Comair, a Delta Connection carrier. I loved it. But business became my passion, and it gave me something a flying schedule could not: more time with my growing family.
Aviation never left me. It remains one of my great loves.
Now I get to share it with my son, an aspiring airline pilot who is now a flight instructor, following in my footsteps. Watching him teach others to fly is one of the proudest full-circle moments of my life. I am so honored to share the sky with him.
I went through a brief season of alcohol addiction. It was a short stint, but it caused real problems. I'm thankful God stepped into my life, changed my behaviors, and pointed me toward recovery and a strong recovery community.
Today I live in long-term recovery, and I call my sobriety a gift. I don't believe addiction defines a life. I believe it can be a pathway toward relationships and community.
That's why I champion people who are struggling, people new to recovery, and people in long-term recovery. My work at YSS is personal: I want young people to know addiction doesn't have to define their futures. There is hope, and there is opportunity for a better life.
Recovery changed my personal life and my leadership. Living the life God designed for me is what makes me an exceptional leader, husband, father, son, brother, and friend.
Aaron and his wife own four Massage Heights retreats across Central Iowa. For them, wellness is not an occasional treat. It is a discipline: regular massage and skin therapy that keeps busy people running strong, the same way training keeps a runner ready.
Thirty years of distance running taught Aaron that recovery is part of performance. His retreats bring that mindset to thousands of members across the metro.
Keynotes and workshops for corporate, nonprofit, and faith audiences. Every talk is built around real stories from the road, the boardroom, and the family table.
People-first leadership that delivers results: safe environments, high standards, and strength-based development that brings out the best in teams.
An optimistic framework from 30 years of distance running: pace yourself, run your own race, and find growth at the wall.
Lessons from scaling a dental enterprise 200%+, leading value-based care transformation at DaVita, and running $49M in emergency procurement.
Leadership where it matters most: what a healthcare CEO learned moving to nonprofit youth services, and why mission is the ultimate growth strategy.
Every essay lives here first, in its permanent home. New pieces published regularly.
Three decades of distance running taught Aaron everything he knows about leadership: pace yourself, run your own race, and remember that the wall is where the growth is.
Read the essayAs Chief Growth Officer at YSS, Aaron leads growth strategy for one of Iowa's largest youth-serving nonprofits, meeting the surge in youth mental health needs across the state. Because every young person who walks through the door is a life that can still change direction.
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