Cameron Nicholson had a head start on his new position when he became president and CEO of the YMCA of Greater Des Moines on Dec. 4.

He had served as interim CEO since June 2023, when former CEO Leisha DeSmet resigned to accept a job with the YMCA of the USA. Nicholson first joined the YMCA of Greater Des Moines in 2012 as executive director of the John R. Grubb Community YMCA at 1611 11th St. on Des Moines’ north side. He also had experience working at YMCAs in Chicago and Charlotte, N.C., before moving to Iowa.  

Now as president and CEO of the YMCA of Greater Des Moines, Nicholson is overseeing all aspects of the YMCA’s operations, including membership, financial sustainability, fundraising, programming, community engagement and staff development.

“I think timing is everything, right, and the fact that it was December, end of the year, the holidays were coming up, so a lot of people were on vacation,” he said. “It’s been kind of a challenge to get going in the new role. But I think being here for the last 11 years in the community, knowing the players on the board, knowing the staff, knowing the community, it hasn’t been like your typical transition in leadership and organization because I’ve been here for over a decade. But I think it was delayed as far as getting things going the first week in an official capacity as president and CEO. We were getting ready for the new year, and we’ll get going on the plans shortly.”

The YMCA has six branch locations, 525 employees and an annual budget of more than $15 million. 

The Business Record recently sat down with Nicholson to discuss his new role and how the YMCA has affected his life:

How did you first become so passionate about the YMCA? 
It started really after college. I did an internship with the YMCA, I had a degree in sports management from Northern Illinois University … part of my bachelor’s degree was to work somewhere in the industry, and I ended up with the YMCA in Chicago. It was a new city YMCA at the time, new city branch, and I was able to really see the organization in its totality, both sides – the admissions side and the fitness side, so workforce development, child care, fitness – just a broad kind of way a YMCA can show up in a community and stand in the gap based on what that community needs the YMCA to be. And I was like, “Wow, I could find myself in this work.” I can find what I’m passionate about, how I care about giving back, so that began my journey in the Y of saying, “Yeah, my values align with this organization, there are opportunities to work in the organization that I think I can be of help and of service.” It’s been a good journey ever since. 

Was working for the YMCA ever an interest of yours growing up?
No. I thought I was going to be a baseball player. I saw myself as an athlete as a kid, like a lot of other kids I grew up with in Chicago. I loved athletics, I was good in school, I was a good student, I had good grades, but I didn’t grow up in a community where I saw a lot of doctors, lawyers, a lot of professionals. I grew up in a poor neighborhood. It just wasn’t at the front of my mind as far as a career. As a kid, I wasn’t thinking about a career. I was thinking about my next game. I think when I got to college and couldn’t play sports anymore, then I had to get serious about what I was going to do. How do you align your passions with the work? I think the bridge between sports management and the Y was this opportunity to give back, through sports and athletics, that we can improve the quality of people’s lives and help people get connected to one another and help people feel like they belong to some sort of community.

Did serving as interim CEO since June 2023 help prepare you for the transition to president and CEO?
I think it helped me in that I knew what the priorities were, I knew what the challenges were, I knew what the opportunities were, I knew the team members that we had in place, and it just allowed me to confidently pursue the opportunities that were before us and also mitigate any sort of anxieties within the organization about what’s next and the anxieties that come with change. I think calming the waters, helping people see that our future is bright, and there are many opportunities for the YMCA to continue to serve Central Iowa in the meaningful ways we’ve done so for 100-plus years. 

What are all of the responsibilities included in your new role?  
I’m responsible for the entire organization, from fundraising for the program, the membership, staff development, financial aspects of it, so all of the buckets as they relate to this organization, I’m ultimately responsible for. And developing and building a team, board development, external and internal relationships, all those things are my responsibility. But no one person can do it all. It’s important to have a really strong team. … We have a good team with senior leadership, and we have good leaders at our local branches who actually do most of the heavy lifting that happens in our organization. And then of course our frontline staff – they’re the secret sauce to our organization. They’re the people on the front lines who greet people every single day when they come in at 5:30 in the morning or 7 o’clock at night. They’re the people who are in the classes, whether it’s pilates, or [high energy aerobic resistance training] class, or youth sports, or child care. It’s still frontline people who are the face of the Y to our participants and our members. It’s not me. I think it’s important as a leader of the organization, I try to model the behavior that I expect from our team members on the front line, and that is to be a welcoming organization, a caring organization and make sure that people who walk through the doors of the YMCA feel like it’s their Y and they belong here. 

How do you feel the transition has gone so far?
It’s hard to grade yourself. That’s the tough part for anybody. I’m results oriented but people focused. There are opportunities for me in my new role to build better relationships with people in the organization and outside of the organization, so I think that’s a headwind, that’s  something before me that I need to really focus on and spend some time with assuring our current team members that what they do matters and that they’re doing a really good job, and then point out opportunities where we can get better. We want to always continuously improve upon what we do. I think externally, it’s going to be a challenge to form relationships. I’m hoping to rebuild the credibility and perception of the YMCA in Central Iowa, that the YMCA as an organization can be a force for good in this community because of not just me as an individual with a title, but because of all of the people who are invested in the organization, from our board members to our advisory board members to our volunteers and also to our staff. 

How big of a role does the YMCA play in the community? 
It’s huge. I think the YMCA continues to be a major player in Central Iowa that is trusted, and I think the thing that warms my heart the most are the stories that I hear from people about their Y experience, whether you’re at the grocery store, you’re in this meeting or that meeting, people go YMCA, not just the song that they sing. People have a Y story. Whether they’re from Iowa or they’re from somewhere else, they will say, ‘Oh, I learned to swim at the Y. Oh, my kids played basketball at the Y. Oh, I volunteered at the Y.’ So probably 7 out of 10 people that I encounter in this community have some sort of Y story. Right now, about 22,000 people are members of the YMCA in Central Iowa. That’s down from where we were before – we’ve downsized some branches – but that’s still a significant amount of people in what I call the west corridor, downtown and also the inner city. 

Why does it mean so much to you to be able to give back to the community? 
First, you have to understand who you are as an individual. I know who I am, and I think I know what my purpose is. And I’m blessed to be a servant leader and to be called to be a servant leader to give back to my community. And I feel fortunate to be able to have a career where that’s what I get to do every day is to figure out ways to bring programs or services to improve the quality of life for people where I live. That’s important to me, and it always has been. This community has embraced me since I got here in 2012. I wasn’t sure about coming here at first. I’m not originally from Iowa, I’m from Chicago, and I worked at the Charlotte, N.C., Y. And I thought I’d come here, I was at the John R. Grubb Y as the executive director, and my goal was I’m going to get a new YMCA for the Grubb because it was an old building, and then I’m going to leave and go off and conquer the YMCA world somewhere. That didn’t happen, and I’m thankful to still be here. And I’m thankful, too, that although the John R. Grubb YMCA will go away in a couple of years, I’m thankful for what the city of Des Moines is doing with the new Reichardt Community [Recreation] Center that’s going to come on board here soon. That community deserves a quality facility. It’s going to lift up so many people’s spirits and foster a sense of community and belonging that’s desperately needed in the 50314, so I’m excited about that. I’m not disappointed there’s not a Y, but it’s a long process, and it continues. But it’s coming to fruition – that vision of delivering a quality resource or asset to the community is important. I think the other part, too, one of the things that happened to me when I was at the Grubb Y was the pool ceiling crashed, and people said, “Close the pool down.” I just remember from my early career and my own personal life, in under-resourced communities it’s difficult to take assets away. If you’re going to be an advocate and an ally for under-resourced communities, you have to fight for those assets not going away. To me, the community, the Y, my voice, other people’s voices, over the years, getting the city and the Y, whomever, the donors to do the right thing, so that community doesn’t lose that resource, I think is important. 

It’s been reported that you planned to conduct internal assessments to ensure the YMCA’s services are still meaningful to the community. Have you started those?
It’ll be a couple weeks. I have invited a group of CEOs from similar-sized YMCAs and/or retired CEOs to come in and do a study for us. They’re coming at the end of [January]. Basically what they do is look under the hood of the YMCA and look at our financials, our program mix, do a facility tour, talk to our board, look at our strategic plans and just give their feedback to us. I think programmatically, we are solid on swim lessons and probably youth sports. But what are really the opportunities to either grow or expand those core services, but then also, what does the community want from the YMCA? I’m on the record saying I want to double down on youth development. We talk about the three pillars of the YMCA, which are youth development, healthy living and social responsibility. And I think we show up pretty well in all three of those areas. I think what is needed in how I want to show up for the community is youth development. And that could look different in each community, not just youth sports, not just swimming, but also child care as well. It could be tutoring and mentoring. We have those programs now. We currently have 20-plus kids in our Y Achievers program, we had 600 kids in competitive swim and we’ve got 1,800 kids in our basketball program. Those are important programs that serve the community, but we can do more, and we should, wherever the greatest needs are.

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At a Glance:
Hometown: Chicago
Age: 56
Family: Son, Jordan Nicholson, 23
Education: Bachelor of Science in sports management from Northern Illinois University
Contact: cameron.nicholson@dmymca.org
Hobbies: Golf is No. 1, my podcasts, and I like to read nonfiction
Current book: I finished “Start with Why” and now I’m reading “The First 90 Days” for work