About Us
Claremont Partners, Inc., creates solutions at the intersection of health and productivity.
Our vision is to optimize health and maximize productivity in the workplace. We add value to our clients' businesses by helping them implement data driven, human capital solutions that clearly demonstrate a better return on their investment in workplace health, behavioral and productivity programs.
The cost of untreated chronic disease conditions — depression, diabetes, asthma and other co-morbid behavioral conditions — cost business and labor billions of dollars a year in lost productivity and contributes to wildly escalating health care premiums.
Claremont Partners was created to help labor and management develop better approaches and real solutions to these persistent problems. We have a passion for organizational change that occurs from the inside out, because we don’t believe that solutions imposed by outside consultants or vendors will last.
Claremont Partners is large enough to support organizations with complex needs and small enough to develop flexible, hands-on solutions that drive results. Claremont Partners benefits from the infrastructure of Claremont Behavioral Services to directly intervene as needed to create healthier and more productive workplaces.
Management Team
Thomas Bjornson is managing partner at Claremont. His career started at PG&E, where he was a pioneer in employee assistance program (EAP) design and development. He maintains a leadership role, having recently served on the National Business Group on Health EAP task force. Building on experience integrating EAPs into management systems, Tom joined Occupational Health Services as a principal and executive vice president. There he developed an EAP service delivery system for employers throughout the U.S.
Tom founded Counseling & Consulting Systems and pioneered the design of behavioral health managed care systems. With venture funding the business expanded, becoming U. S. Behavioral Health, which was later sold to Traveler's Insurance. As a Convoy Corporation director, and through involvement in other HR-related technology projects, Tom has a vision for the critical role IT plays in health care and in benefits integration.
He founded Claremont Behavioral Services in 1990. It has grown to be one of the largest most innovative EAP firms in the San Francisco Bay Area. Tom has a BA in Economics and Business from San Jose State University.
Devon Devine, JD, brings a solid background in participant-directed healthcare and a particular interest in uncovering and exploring new technologies and methodologies that improve how patients, payers, and providers manage health and financial priorities. Devon started his career as an analyst at Accenture, supporting design, build, and run of Medicaid management information systems. Subsequently, Devon served as in-house counsel to HSA Bank, the leading independent custodian of health savings accounts. Devon also headed up the strategic product direction at Members Health Network, setting architecture and infrastructure direction for software as a service to credit unions. Devon earned a B.A. with honors in Rhetoric at U.C. Berkeley and holds a JD from the University of Chicago Law School.
John Langefeld, MD, has served the health care industry for over 30 years, in both high-level administrative and hands-on medical care roles. His primary focus is using data and technology to support better decision-making in health care; his customers include self-insured employers, Medicaid and Medicare programs and MCOs. As a physician, Dr. Langefeld has practiced in family care, urgent care facilities, emergency rooms, academic environment, and in large and small provider groups and partnerships. As an administrator, Dr. Langefeld has held positions including, Executive Vice President, Chief Medical Officer, Medical Director and Medical Review Officer. He has held leadership roles in Health Plans, MSO’s, IPA’s, and physician/provider groups. Dr. Langefeld also taught for four years in the Clinical Program Unit at the University of Kentucky Chandler Medical Center. Dr. Langefeld holds an MD from the University of Louisville School of Medicine and a BA in Biology from Berea College.
Phil Polakoff, MD, MPH, is a consultant to Claremont and its clients. He has spent his life improving health, protecting the environment, and championing civil and human rights. He worked for the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health, and formed a non-profit health and environmental organization which treated thousands of East Bay shipyard workers exposed to asbestos and other toxics. He then started his own family practice, which he maintained for over 20 years. In 1990, Dr. Polakoff founded a successful consulting firm, dedicated to improving health care by expanding employee/dependant access to quality health care providers. His clients included noted private and public entities as well as numerous Taft-Hartley Trust Funds. Dr. Polakoff has written a nationally syndicated column for consumers, authored several health-related books, and lectured at U.C. Berkeley and Stanford University. He is board certified in preventive medicine. He has a BS degree from Cornell University and earned his MD from Wayne State and Oxford University. He also has an MPH from UC Berkeley and a master's degree in environmental science from Rutgers.
