Inform USA Welcomes Greg Bloom at Sr. Director of Strategy & Partnerships

Inform USA, the industry association representing information-and-referral (I&R) providers across government and nonprofit human service sectors, has added Greg Bloom to their team as the Sr. Director of Strategy and Partnerships. 

Greg is best known for his work leading the Open Referral Initiative, a global community of practice dedicated to the development of data standards and open source tools that make it easier to find, share, and use information about health, human and social services. 

Bloom and Inform USA enjoy a long collaborative history dating back to the origin of the Open Referral initiative. More recently, Bloom and Inform USA have developed programming for the Inform USA national conference, supported AIRS embrace of open source publishing for our style guide and standards, and partnered on a grant-funded effort to develop the initial Human Service Data API protocols. Five years ago, AIRS endorsed Open Referral’s Human Service Data Specifications as industry standards for resource data exchange. 

In the new role of Sr. Director of Strategy and Partnerships, Bloom will work with Inform USA's staff, committees, and state affiliates to develop their policy platform, partnership models, and engagement strategies. This role will also serve as the facilitator of the Taxonomy Task Force, which is developing policy recommendations and industry guidance for human service classification methods.

“There are many high-level sector issues such as AI and information sharing where Inform USA wishes to offer support and guidance to our members. We are thrilled that Greg is going to bring this expertise to our team and to the membership,” explained Katie Appold, Inform USA’s Executive Director. 

Inform USA Members are invited to an “Meet and Greet and Ask me Anything!” session with Greg Bloom on January 31, at 3:00pm EST. This will be an opportunity to learn more about Greg’s role, background, and big ideas. 

“Inform USA occupies a unique position across all domains of health, human, and social services – as the standard-setting brain-trust for the field of human service information-and-referral – and I am thrilled to be joining their team,” says Greg. ”While my work with the Open Referral community will continue separately, and independently, I believe that through this partnership we can facilitate the evolution of our safety net into an adaptive, transparent, and effective ecosystem that equitably meets the needs of people and communities across the country.”