Healthcare administration, a viable career option for the new millennium

Black Collegian, Oct 1999 by Scroggins, Lynne

Getting Ready

In the ever-changing healthcare administration profession, like in many other specialized fields, you have to cross one hurdle at a time to achieve your goal. Your undergraduate curriculum should include subjects such as accounting, finance, organizational behavior, technology support, public speaking and basic writing skills in order to have the basics for entering graduate school. It is important to practice public speaking and business writing as often as possible. Graduate school is important because most of the executives who rise to senior management in a health care setting have a master's degree in healthcare or business. When choosing a graduate school, check the percentage of students placed into residencies or mid-level management positions upon graduation. If that percentage is 90 percent or above, it's worth continued follow through to see if the school would be a good match for you.

Stay busy during your summer vacation by working or volunteering in a hospital or healthcare setting doing whatever you can. It will give you an opportunity to " feel the pulse" of the organization and most likely meet some interesting executives. There are several opportunities for summer internships during your college career with our professional organizations. In particular, the Institute for Diversity in Healthcare Management headquartered in Chicago, IL, offers college and graduate students summer internships in various cities. There are also several colleges and universities that offer summer learning programs to students interested in the healthcare field. Check with your placement office or just call some medical schools and inquire about summer opportunities. You will likely be pleased with the outcome.

Healthcare Career Options

The very first job that most graduates seek after earning their master's degree is an Administrative Residency in the healthcare setting of your choice. In this position, the resident learns about the organizational structure and political culture of an organization. Each resident is assigned to an executive level team member (often the CEO) and serves as their assistant for one year. During that year, the resident is assigned projects that directly impact hospital operations and are directed so that they may apply their formal training in problem solving. This hands-on opportunity generally gives the resident the unique opportunity to work directly with senior management in a learning capacity@ If you work hard and gain the respect of senior management, the individual that leads you through this year of residency usually carries the honor of your mentor/preceptor throughout your career. My mentor, Eugene Cash-man, CEO for LeBonheur Children's Hospital in 1985, told me to use the hospital as my laboratory for the one year of my residency. He encouraged me to independently practice my management skills while he remained close enough to guide me. Salaries for the Administrative Residency typically start around $25,000 per year.

During your residency, you will be able to decide if you would like a line management or staff role as your career foundation. Line management is the track to the CEO's position, while staff roles are organizational support functions such as human resources or quality management. The CEO has to set the organization's strategic plan, understand customer service, master organization behavior and rules of financial management to move the organization forward. Elliott Roberts, retired CEO of the Medical Center of Louisiana in New Orleans and one of the first African-American hospital administrators in the country, says students considering the line management track may begin, after their administrative residency, as a department or service line director. Ina support role, one usually develops one area of specialty or expertise. In Human Resources, for instance, you must understand things like labor laws, employee grievance procedures, and payroll methods. There are even specific computer programs designed specifically for human resource management like People-Soft, and it is a great benefit to know how to operate such a system. Computer buffs may become expert in Wide Area Network (WAN) or Local Area Network (LAN) development for health care systems like Columbia / HCA or Tenet. There are also hospital finance software packages that are designed for hospital/healthcare billing and accounts receivable. Because of increased automation, the health care industry has recognized technology as an integral hospital entity and many are recruiting for Chief Information Officers (CIO), also a specialized staff role.

Managed Care companies are thriving all over the country and provide a wonderful opportunity for recent graduates. The theory of the managed care industry is to give individuals a limited choice of where they will receive their medical care and negotiate with the healthcare providers to reduce their cost of service to members of the managed care network. Many are also realizing the importance of Long-term Care and its overreaching effects on our aging population. Nursing Home/Assisted Living Care is one of the fastest growing segments of the healthcare industry. As we see the never-ending media coverage of patient abuse in the nursing home industry, there is a great need for talented administrators to enter the field. The healthcare consulting industry takes on a broad number of issues where expertise in every aspect of healthcare operations is necessary. Many of the big ten firms in the country seek recent graduates so that they can mold them into accomplished consultants. Usually when a healthcare facility seeks the service of a consulting agency, they want the agency to focus on one or two major challenges facing their particular facility. Consultants must know how to work with all levels of health care delivery staff and give formal professional advice in an effort to improve operational effectiveness. Some other career areas of specialty include information technology, marketing, architecture, financial management, food service administration, medical records, pharmacy, engineering and of course, medical personnel like physicians, nurses and adjunct therapists.