About the Executive MHA
Learning Designed for Executives and Health Professionals
Our Executive MHA Program is specifically designed for practicing executives, physicians, and other healthcare professionals seeking to advance their management and leadership capabilities. Specific features of this design include the following:
- This is the executive education route to the No. 2-ranked MHA degree in the nation, taught by the nationally recognized faculty of a strong academic health center in a leading research university.
- The 42-credit curriculum includes a focus on the management of complex, integrated health systems, including the expanded role of physicians as providers, managers, and leaders in those systems.
- Program faculty are actively involved in applied research on health systems with a focus on integrated health system performance.
- The on-campus sessions invite alumni and expert speakers to participate with students in symposia and other learning events.
- Students complete the MHA degree in 25 months.
- The program is designed to minimize interference with work and family: most of the coursework is online and asynchronous; students spend only 28 days on campus over 25 months; students take no more than 2 courses at a time.
- The program builds on the practical application of learning to the participant’s organization. Students develop and introduce innovation into their organizations.
- The program is based on a learning cohort model in which students start the program together and progress through the same curriculum, providing myriad opportunities for students to learn and work together.
Integrated Health Systems
The U.S. healthcare delivery marketplace is consolidating. Integrated health systems are forming in rural and urban markets at an accelerating rate. “Integrated Health System” refers to a clinical care, business, and delivery model where most, if not all, physicians are required to meet a health system’s mission and clinical care goals are integrated with hospitals in a unified business structure.
As health systems reach a critical mass of integrated physicians, operating economics are changed such that more traditional hospital and medical group performance benchmarks, reference points and decision-making models become less useful to leaders. Likewise, traditional approaches to strategic and business planning and related predictive modeling are less applicable given the nature of the relevant performance metrics of integrated health systems.
The Executive MHA addresses the need for advanced leadership and management education for clinical and administrative professionals in integrated health systems. Most healthcare provider organizations face a shortage of qualified management talent. In the next decade, a significant proportion of current managers in these organizations are expected to retire. This situation is exacerbated in integrated health systems where clinical professionals will be moved into top management positions.
History
The University of Minnesota Program in Healthcare Administration is in a unique position to offer the Executive MHA. It holds a position of prominence among the nation’s healthcare administration programs and is currently ranked as the No. 2 program by U.S. News and World Report. Our alumni occupy positions of authority in institutions throughout the United States and remain connected to and engaged in our program’s progress. Our program is supported by a faculty with standing in the research community and with strong reputations in the community of practice. We are housed in the School of Public Health, which is known for innovation in professional education.
The University of Minnesota MHA Program holds a national reputation for innovation in distance education, having developed the nation’s first executive education program for healthcare administrators. That program enrolled more than 3,000 students over its 40-year history.