Jason Thomas is being honored in Category 1: Building a Customer Focused Culture for his exceptional leadership in strengthening the Department of Veterans Affairs' commitment to delivering a better experience for Veterans, their families, caregivers, and survivors. As Chief of Staff for the Veterans Experience Office (VEO), Jason helped transform how VA listens to and acts on Veteran feedback, ensuring that customer experience became a lasting, enterprise-wide priority. His steady leadership during a period of significant organizational change fostered a culture of transparency, accountability, and unwavering dedication to those who served.

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Jason played a pivotal role in modernizing VA's Voice of the Customer program, enabling Veteran feedback to directly inform improvements in health care, benefits, and services. He helped lead the reorganization of the Veterans Experience Office into a stronger enterprise capability and was instrumental in advancing the Improving Veterans' Experience Act of 2025, which formally established VEO in law. Internally, he guided staff through organizational change with compassion and clarity, maintaining full workforce retention while creating practical processes to ensure Veterans visiting VA Central Office received immediate support, including training security personnel to identify and assist Veterans in distress.

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The impact of Jason's leadership is reflected in stronger trust, improved accountability, and better service delivery across the VA. In FY2025, VA achieved 79.5% overall trust and a record 92.9% trust in VA health care, while collecting more than 17.3 million Veteran feedback responses to continuously improve services. His work helped strengthen the systems and culture supporting millions of clinical appointments, contact center interactions, and benefit services each year. Although Jason passed away on Veterans Day 2025, his legacy lives on through the legislation he helped champion, the organization he strengthened, and the enduring culture of customer-focused service he inspired throughout the Department of Veterans Affairs.