Finn Partners picks Kristie Kuhl to lead its global health practice

Finn Partners has promoted Kristie Kuhl to managing partner and global health practice leader. 

In the newly created position, Kuhl is charged with solidifying Finn Partners’ strategy and values across its global offices to better serve health clients. 

"In this new role, I want to make sure that I'm making it easier for people to take the best practices that we have in various locations and remove the barriers," Kuhl said. "If amazing work is happening in Boston, we want people in London to know about that and apply those insights for their clients." 

Kuhl will be taking over the responsibilities leading the practice from Gil Bashe, managing partner and global health chair, who will be focusing more closely on acquisitions, agency-wide strategic efforts, client priorities and partnerships for Finn Partners’ health practice. Kuhl will report to Bashe. 

Kuhl's appointment comes at a time when Finn Partners is preparing to further expand its health practice as demands from the sector have grown amid the COVID-19 pandemic. 

In the six years since the start of Finn's health practice, it's revenue has spiked from $8 million to more than $35 million in client fees and the agency has come to represent many big names throughout the global health sector.

Finn's health practice, with some 175 staff, is now positioned to address health opportunities agency-wide, and in 2020 added clients including Bausch + Lomb, Corbus Pharmaceuticals, Johnson & Johnson and Metro Nashville COVID-19 Response. 

Kuhl was selected for the role because of her background in health and ability to work across geographies, cultures and disciplines, including patient advocacy, biopharmaceuticals and entrepreneurship, said Bashe. 

"You need a unique individual who can understand how these different sectors connect at some points and disconnect at others," he said. "She recognizes the differentiators of our practice, which helps clients navigate that fragmentation successfully." 

Kuhl joined Finn in 2015 as senior partner and U.S. pharma and New York health head after working for almost 15 years as EVP at Makovsky and then Cohn & Wolfe. 

In June, Finn Partners acquired Atlanta-based health technology communications firm Agency Ten22.

In 2020, Finn Partners reported revenue of $108.9 million, down 9% from the year prior, according to PRWeek’s Agency Business Report 2021.