Kaiser Foundation Health Plan has begun a nationwide search for a successor to Jan Head, who will leave as president of Kaiser Permanente Hawaii early next year.

Head, 54, is leaving to be closer to family on the Mainland and do more traveling with her husband, a retired commissioned military officer, said Kaiser spokeswoman Lynn Kenton. Head joined Kaiser 10 years ago and for the past four years has overseen the Hawai'i operations that include a hospital and 18 outpatient clinics.

Kenton said Head will stay on until a successor is selected and will probably leave Kaiser early next year. Kaiser is the state's largest health maintenance organization with about 225,000 members.

Kaiser Permanente Hawaii also is looking for a replacement for Allison Maney, who has served as its acting chief financial officer following the retirement this year of Arnold Ma-tsunobu. Maney had taken the post on an interim basis and plans to return to the Mainland by the end of December, Kenton said.

Kaiser has narrowed its list of candidates for the financial post and hopes to make an announcement soon, Kenton said.

The management change is "an opportunity to bring in new people with great vision," said Kenton.

The departures of Head and Maney come as Kaiser announced last week it would layoff about 1 percent of its 4,800 workers, in part because of rising costs and a decline in membership.

Other management changes at Kaiser include the departure of Claudia Schmidt, vice president of business development, and the resignation of Norman Quon as director of facilities this year.

In addition, Kaki Jennings, who worked for 28 years at Kaiser, retired in August as vice president of human resources.

Schmidt was replaced by William J. Corba who most recently was a general manager for Cigna Healthcare in Southern California. Quon's duties are currently being handled by Susan Gantz, who also is director of facilities for Kaiser's Northwest division, while Jennings' interim replacement is Tammy Jones from Kaiser's Georgia region.