Healthcare

I have fortunately been able to pursue an MBA without pausing my work through Georgia Tech's Evening MBA program. I started the MBA program living three hours away from campus, but I was able to make this work with my seven days on/off schedule, which is common for healthcare workers in the doctorate level of my field.

The biggest challenge has been arranging logistics to stay working full time while pursuing an MBA. Thankfully, my boss worked with me to allow me to switch shifts to attend classes when I was living three hours away.

Pharmacy school is very mathematics and systems based. My systematic approach to studying has translated well with the business curriculum. Because I work primarily in critical care, I am trained to make decisions based on risk/benefit assessments when information may be incomplete, and the answers are not always clear. This mode of thinking quickly, rationally, and evidence-based has translated well when working through simulations and business cases.

I think picking a concentration based on your knowledge gaps is a bit short-sighted, and I would encourage other students to pick the concentration in the direction of where you want to go. I plan to go with Data Analytics. This concentration is in the direction where I want my practice and career to evolve to.

I’ve found that making quick, evidence-based risk/benefit assessments, looking beyond the question presented to discern important subtext, and being comfortable with mathematics and Excel have all helped me in the MBA.

Because my training is in pharmacy, I feel this prepared me well for business school. I did enjoy the HBS courses Statistics for Managers and Algebra for Managers that I took prior to starting the program.

I am fully engaging in campus events and meeting people with multiple professional backgrounds. I think the important thing for me is to stay true to my mission—to bring quality healthcare to individuals facing high adverse social determinants of health and leveraging data analytics to accomplish this goal.

For now, I am moving up in leadership within a health system. I recently accepted a job with Northside Hospital in Canton, and the encouragement from my mentors at Georgia Tech has been paramount for me. I am going in as a leader, and I am confident. The CHARGE program has been very helpful to me, and I have also formed strong mentorship relationships with leaders in the Executive MBA program.

I currently feel like I speak a foreign language to some, and this has been a bit frustrating. Emphasizing my value-add being a pharmacist, and not a physician, has been complicated to explain.

I would ask yourself where you want to go. Is the MBA program going to help you level up in your current role? Or are you looking for a complete life change? I would say that many medical organizations will pay for some or most of your MBA, so why not take advantage of these perks? You can then at least explore opportunities for career growth outside of your current bubble.

Mentors:

• Robin Mladinich with the CHARGE leadership coaching program
• Mel Tobias recent graduate from the Executive MBA program 

Books:

• "The First 90 Days" by Michael Watkins
• "Atomic Habits" by James Clear

The healthcare landscape can seem a bit precarious. I think that now it is more important than ever to see how you can streamline services without compromising care. This is one of the reasons I have leaned into learning as much as I can about data analytics.

As a front-line healthcare worker, I see the disparity every single day. I know the pain points, because I experience them first-hand. I also see where things can be made better, and having MBA by my name will help me have more impact. My impact is twofold—as a voice that will be respected when making business decisions and a voice that can be an advocate for the patient at the other end of a computer program.