Day three of the 2026 NACCHO360 conference featured a variety of opportunities for the conference’s over 2,300 in-person and virtual attendees to learn, connect, and celebrate accomplishments.

Thursday’s plenary session began with a passing of the gavel to Patrick McGough, DNP, incoming President of NACCHO’s Board of Directors and Chief Executive Officer and Chief Public Health Officer of the Oklahoma City and Oklahoma County Health Department. McGough shared future-focused remarks, noting his optimism for the future of local public health, “not because the challenges are small, but because the people leading public health are extraordinary.” He noted opportunities for local leaders to modernize systems, strengthen partnerships, prepare the next generation of public health leaders, and ensure that public health is at every table where decisions are being made. He concluded his remarks with a call to attendees to leave the conference with more ideas and new contacts, to lead one courageous conversation they’ve been avoiding, to forge one partnership they’ve been meaning to build, to make one investment in their workforce, and to tell one story that only they can tell.

Panelists then joined the stage for a conversation about “Caring for the Caregivers of Public Health.”

Caring for the Caregivers of Public Health

Eric Zimmerman, Chief Product Officer at CredibleMind, led the discussion and opened with a call for attendees to identify one thing from the session to take back to their workforce, both for the people they serve and for themselves. He highlighted purpose as a key driver of the public health workforce and encouraged listeners to ask a person on their team a little bit about their purpose. “It turns out this has a dramatic impact on their sense of being,” said Zimmerman. He also pointed out that culture isn’t a thing we measure and manipulate; it’s an emergent property of how we treat each other.

Rachel Hare Bork, Director of the Public Health Workforce Interests and Needs Survey (PH WINS) at de Beaumont Foundation, shared key findings from the PH Wins Pulse Check which included responses from almost 5,000 state and local public health workers. The study found that public health professionals are under a lot of pressure and reporting growing strain that is felt most acutely by younger employees. Over 70% of state and local government public health workers reported experiencing at least one symptom of burnout and one in five workers experience near constant symptoms of burnout. Bork pointed out that this burnout jeopardizes the health of individuals and the people in the jurisdictions that they serve.

Jon Adler, Chief Medical Officer and Co-Editor-in-Chief at CredibleMind, explored different ways we can build our own self-worth and help build the self-worth of others. He called for doing the hard work of examining needed systemic and organizational change versus the individual change that needs to happen. Adler also pointed out that common threats to mental and physical health can sometimes come fast, and sometimes we don’t recognize the severity until the health threat is upon us.

Alex Reed-Harbour, Division Manager - Community Health at Denton County Health Department (TX), shared her personal journey with the physical effects of burnout and the steps she took to combat them. “I’m one story among thousands of stories in this room,” said Reed-Harbour. “I love public health with every fiber of my being. In order to keep doing this work, I had to learn to take care of myself.” She encouraged attendees to practice celebration among their teams, recognizing both the big and small things with little acts of fun to nurture organizational culture and energy. She also shared her practice of focusing on “the next right choice” and encouraged public health leaders to do the same in their path forward.

Dr. Amit Sood, CEO at the Global Center for Resiliency and Wellbeing, began by talking about the cognitive overload our brains now shoulder and suggested a strategy to mitigate it: