People Moves: Baum to Succeed Swedlow as President of CWCI

The board of directors of the California Workers’ Compensation Institute named the institute’s chief operating officer, Gideon L. Baum, as its next president. Baum will succeed Alex Swedlow when Swedlow retires next summer.

Swedlow announced in November he planed to retire from his post as president of CWCI. Swedlow’s retirement caps a 37-year association with the institute that began in 1988 as a volunteer on CWCI’s Research Committee, then as a consultant. In 1998, he served as the systems architect and project manager for the Industry Claims Information System. Following that, he was named the CWCI senior vice president of research, and eventually he succeeded J. Michael Nolan as president of the organization in 2013.

Baum will become the fifth president at CWCI in more than 60 years.

Baum formally joined CWCI last year as chief operating officer. Before joining CWCI, Baum was a vice president of policy at the California Hospital Association from 2021 to 2024. Prior to CHA, Baum served as a committee consultant of the California State Senate Committee on Labor and Public Employment.