10 In-Demand Careers in Healthcare Leadership

Director of Nursing / Chief Nursing Director

Also known as Chief Nursing Officers (CNOs), these professionals oversee and plan the nursing activities of individual wards or whole hospitals/facilities. They ensure their staff follow nursing protocols and regulations, work with other hospital leaders to continually improve patient care, and manage budgets for those in their purview. They may also work closely with the HR director to oversee employment needs, including training and continuing education. CNOs must take a hands-on approach to ensure everything runs smoothly, inventories stay stocked, and nurses continue to develop.

Head Nurse

Working in this role allows you to act as the lead nurse during your shift. In addition to overseeing other nurses working at the same time, you are also charged with managing patient care and making sure everything runs smoothly. Other nurses will come to you with questions or issues and look to you for answers and advice. When outside of your purview, you go to the director of nursing to seek help. Other responsibilities include speaking with patients and their families about treatment plans, assigning nurse rotations, and handling staffing issues as needed.

Healthcare Actuary

These professionals most commonly work for health insurance companies to help them understand risks and figure out how to price premiums for a variety of customers. They usually spend their days looking at health cost data, both from the past and present, as a way of understanding cost trends and providing leadership to insurance companies on how to set their prices. They may also game out potential issues or concerns and advise insurance executives on how to face the financial challenges present within the healthcare industry.

Healthcare Administrator

Healthcare administrators spend their days overseeing the day-to-day operations of individual departments and areas of a healthcare facility or organization. Some common responsibilities include developing and managing budgets, working with the HR department to locate and hire qualified staff members, creating and implementing ongoing training programs, and meeting departmental goals and benchmarks. Some administrators may also be in charge of creating weekly work schedules, representing their department at board meetings, looking for ways to improve delivery of care outcomes, and attending regular meetings with other departmental administrators to set new goals.

Healthcare Manager

While healthcare administrators most commonly focus on the daily operations of a single department or area, healthcare managers typically spend their days addressing big-picture work for an entire facility or organization. Common responsibilities can include ensuring the facility complies with all state and federal regulatory requirements, overseeing staff operations, including training initiatives, and setting overall annual budgets. They may also speak before the board of directors or governors and confer with other senior-level healthcare colleagues on ongoing and future initiatives within their organization.

Hospital Chief Executive Officer (CEO)

Hospital CEOs control the levers of power within their facilities, making important decisions and creating a plan for the overall direction of the business. Working alongside other C-Level executives, the CEO ensures the best level of care is provided to patients and their families, cultivates a positive staff and patient culture, and develops relationships with outside organizations that can help bring in new talent and expand the reach of the organization. Some CEOs also oversee procedures and policies related to clinical care and ensure all state, federal, and industry-specific guidelines are followed.

Hospital Chief Financial Officer

Hospital CFOs hold responsibility for all financial systems and operations within the hospital, making them a critical part of the management team. Creating the overall annual budget, approving individual department budgets, and keeping all financial systems functioning properly represents only a small portion of the work they do. Other tasks include managing other staff working in finance, keeping up with all regulatory requirements around accounting and transparency, and participating in any and all internal and/or external audit requests as needed. They frequently confer with other C-Level executives on the overall function and direction of the facility.

Patient Care Director

Directors of patient care services develop and maintain an environment for patients and their families that emphasizes best practices, cutting-edge research, and well-trained care providers. Straddling the line between clinical care and business functions, patient care directors must take prime responsibility for clinical functions while also creating strategies that help bring in new clients and improve earnings. They work closely with directors of nursing to ensure nursing staff follow the policies and procedures for providing top-tier patient care. Rather than sitting in an office all day, these professionals can often be found moving from department to department, ensuring that protocols are followed, and everything runs smoothly.

Health Information Management Director

Functioning more on the technical side of things, health information management directors concern themselves with topics such as medical records and coding. With their purview typically expanding across several departments, these directors may manage a large number of medical coding and billing professionals. This includes hiring professionals to fill the roles and ensuring they receive the required ongoing training to do their jobs effectively. Other responsibilities may include researching and implementing new coding systems, ensuring network security for patient records, and working with each department to make sure all laws and compliance regulations are closely followed.

Nursing Home Administrator

Nursing home administrators spend their days ensuring that residents in their charge receive the best care possible. In addition to overseeing and coordinating the work of individual departments, they also have a say in staff hiring and ongoing training programs, financial management and budget development, and regulatory compliance around patient care and delivery. Administrators are expected to understand and follow local, state, and federal laws around nursing home facilities and ensure their staff do the same. They must also present to their board of directors on facility management and ongoing initiatives.

1) What is the most rewarding part of working as a healthcare leader?

By far the most rewarding part of leading in healthcare is seeing those whom you mentor succeed in their own careers. Very often, as a healthcare provider, you have the opportunity to interact with or supervise students who are making career decisions. It is exciting to walk with them as they succeed. Personally, having achieved my professional goals, helping someone else do so is extremely rewarding.

2) What are some things you didn’t know about the responsibilities you would undertake?

Managing an online pharmacy with its hands in so many various projects and partnerships pulls me in many different directions. Each partnership secured by our business development brings a new set of exciting challenges that are always unique.

Figuring out how to implement each different scenario into our workflow, deciding which employees possess the skill sets to succeed, and ensuring that all patients get what they need in a timely manner is difficult, but exhilarating.

3) What advice would you give to students/professionals considering becoming a leader or manager in healthcare?

Leading in healthcare requires excellent people skills. Most healthcare settings also need individuals who simply possess a lot of knowledge or are extremely efficient, but those called upon to manage must have very strong communication skills.

They must be able to relate to both patient situations as well as corporate and employee needs. The patient needs to feel that their struggle is important. They need to see compassion on the face of their healthcare leader. At the same time, the “game face” must be put on when it comes time to deal with business matters. In the blink of an eye, one must be able to switch those hats on and off.

4) How do you see these roles evolving in the next few years?

Healthcare in the U.S. is always evolving. On the other side of a global pandemic, I would expect that telehealth will continue to grow. Patients will grow accustomed to e-visits and demand more flexibility from providers.

In turn, many provider environments may change as foot traffic decreases. Leading in healthcare will then become a more delicate balancing act: through personal and professional skills, the medical provider will need to bridge the gap created by more physical distance (as employees are either scattered or work from home).