Daphne Walker Enjoys the Best of Both Worlds at JPS Health Network

Not too many people can say that they’ve had two successful careers, but Daphne Walker can. Before becoming a chief legal officer (CLO) in the healthcare industry, she was a nurse for more than a decade. She not only had a chance to practice in all areas of that field, but also to make it to the pinnacle of the profession in roles including chief nursing officer, performance improvement manager, and various nurse clinical roles.

As she performed more work in hospital risk, she became more interested in law and went on to forge a legal career with a focus on healthcare matters. Today, she is executive vice president and chief legal officer at JPS Healthcare Network, which serves the healthcare needs of families in Tarrant County, the third-most populous county in Texas. It’s a role that allows Walker to have “the best of both worlds as a former practicing nurse and a legal professional,” she says.

“You don’t get all the warm and fuzzy experiences you have on the clinical side when you deal with patients and see their journey firsthand, but the skills I needed to support them at the bedside allows me to keep an eye toward customer service as I deliver legal advice,” Walker shares. “As we work with our internal business operators, it’s easy to piggyback off those soft skills and to be empathetic with what they’re trying to accomplish while being the risk manager for the organization.”

As the organization’s first in-house CLO, Walker has played an instrumental role in identifying critical legal needs for JPS and building up a strong legal team with appropriate foundational processes and policies. Building a supportive legal culture has also been a focus, says Walker.

“I remind our team constantly that we have to be a partner that supports the business. We can’t quickly dismiss things that seem complicated. We have to work through it. At the same time, we have a job,” Walker says. “So, we have to balance that support with the understanding that there may be times when we have to draw a line if we can’t move forward with something. That’s a skillset. You don’t want your internal client to view you as a roadblock. They have to feel comfortable coming to you but also understand your ethical obligations to the hospital district.”

Walker has no problem demonstrating how that balance can be struck. For a servant leader like her, it starts by asking people what they need, a trait that has allowed her team members to view her as a mentor. 

“It helps me understand how to focus on things that are most important to my team, to keep them engaged, and to see [me] as a partner and a resource,” she shares. “I want to make sure I’m developing my team and that I’m someone they can come to. Similarly, I strive to be the person my business partners can come to for general advice. I lean in with my C-suite leaders to find out what is top of mind for them, making sure we’re in step and that we’re getting ahead of challenges together.”

After graduating as the first African American valedictorian from her high school, she initially planned to study business in college. But her mom, who had spent her career as a nurse, inspired her to go down the same path.

“I watched her in that career and thought it was rewarding, lucrative, and offered a work/life balance,” Walker says, who started her family while she was still in college. She received her nursing degree in 1997 and spent the next few years working her way up the nursing management ladder at Hereford Regional Medical Center and Medical Center of Arlington. In the latter organization, she also worked as a medical surgical nurse while attending law school.

Her legal journey has been just as inspiring. She got her start at Fulbright & Jaworski (now Norton Rose Fulbright), where she became an expert on various healthcare-related operational, contractual, and transactional matters. From there she took her expertise in-house at Tenet Healthcare and United Surgical Partners International before coming to JPS.

While Walker’s clinical background gave her the skills she needed to succeed in law, so did the guidance of several mentors. Today, she aims to help young people in a similar way. She wants them to internalize an idea a mentor once imparted to her: “There’s no such thing as a draft.”

“When you’re getting started, don’t just think that since you don’t know something that you should show up unprepared. Everything you put in front of someone is an opportunity for them to notice you,” Walker says.