Lessons Learned: Stories from Women Physician Leaders

Edited by Deborah M. Shlian, MD, MBA

Women physicians now comprise 50 percent or more of most U.S. medical school classes. Yet relatively few fill the most senior management positions within the healthcare system. At a time when most agree that the U.S. healthcare delivery system needs fundamental change, this book makes the case for talented women physician executives, articulate in the language of healthcare policy and business, to be among those leading the way.

In Lessons Learned: Stories from Women Physician Leaders, editor and author Deborah M. Shlian, MD, MBA, profiles 33 exceptional women physicians who have defied the odds. They share their personal and compelling stories — including obstacles and challenges faced in balancing work, family, and personal life — as their career paths take them from clinical medicine to leadership within government, academia, hospitals, provider groups, managed care, pharma, consulting, and entrepreneurial venture. The lessons they learned are relevant not only to women and do not apply just to healthcare—they are universal.

The stories (which are actually “case studies”) illustrate the trailblazing and creativity of a group of professional women who understand how to use processes and procedures to manage the complexities of large organizations and how to exercise leadership to motivate and lead others through change and uncertainty.

This anthology of the experiences and achievements of women physician leaders is a highly diverse, always inspiring, and content-rich resource that’s valuable whether a physician is just starting out or at a turning point in life and career.

Lessons Learned is a distinctive resource, addressing such topics as:

• Career 0ptions after medical training.
• Leadership opportunities beyond a traditional clinical setting.
• Challenges for women in the workplace, discrimination, salary discrepancies, and different expectations.
• Role models, mentorships, and sponsorships at the leadership level.
• Work-life balance.

Readers of Lessons Learned will gain insight into real-life career journeys. By sharing their personal experiences—the challenges and the triumphs—these remarkable women empower each other and other women like them who are forging their own paths as physician leaders. There is a collective pride in what they have accomplished.

The diversity of career paths and personal circumstances offer a wide variety of experiences and dimensions of relatability difficult to find elsewhere. These women come from all walks of life, have faced and overcome many challenges, and demonstrated creativity in their career choices. As readers consider and reflect on each physician’s path, they are inspired to reflect on and explore their own.

These physician leaders are making a difference and inspiring other physicians to achieve higher levels of leadership, including positions with wide-ranging responsibilities.

Bonus #1:  Many chapters include a vignette about leadership and how to navigate the complex environment of an often male-dominated upper echelon work environment. It provides an opportunity to know there is a support system in a physician’s career journey. 

Bonus #2:  Virtually all the women in this book are willing to mentor and share advice. They can provide a valuable resource for young physicians looking for support. Contacts are available through the editor Dr. Deborah Shlian.

From the Foreword by Theresa Rohr-Kirchgraber, MD, FACP, FAMWA, president of the American Medical Women’s Association (AMWA),

“From these women, we can all learn that that if there is not a path, we can create one. If the path is not well trodden, we must walk it and make it passable for the next generation. If the path is narrow, we must walk with others as we widen it. None of us is on this journey alone. We stand on the shoulders of those who have gone before us, beside those who are with us, and for those who come after us.”

About the Editor

Deborah M. Shlian, MD, MBA, is a board-certified Family Practitioner with more than three decades of clinical and management experience. Dr. Shlian has been able to balance work life with writing, producing several nonfiction articles, chapters, and books on medical management issues. She also writes fiction. All have won literary awards, including the Florida Book Award’s Gold Medal.

Table of Contents

• Foreword: Physicians in Leadership
  Theresa Rohr-Kirchgraber, MD, FACP, FAMWA
• Chapter One
  An Overview
  By Deborah M. Shlian, MD, MBA

GOVERNMENT 

• Chapter Two
  Sex and Science Drove My Life
  By Florence Haseltine, MD, PhD 
• Chapter Three
  Boundroid
  By Margaret (Maggi) Cary, MD, MBA, MPH

• Chapter Four
  Trying to Make the World a Better Place
  By Ora Hirsch Pescovitz, MD 
• Chapter Five
  Learning to Lead
  By Donna Parker, MD
• Chapter Six
  Clinician to Environmental Activist
  By Mona Hanna-Attisha, MD, MPH

• Chapter Seven
  Life Is Not a Straight Line
  By Kathleen Yaremchuk, MD, MSA 
• Chapter Eight
  Life Is a Series of Useful Lessons
  By Patricia A. Gabow, MD
• Chapter Nine
  Be Yourself, Everyone Else Is Already Taken
  By Jayne McCormick, BSN, MD, MBA
• Chapter Ten
  Finding the Right Niche
  By Elaine E. Batchlor, MD, MPH
• Chapter Eleven
  Medical Manager: Was It Worth It?
  By Selma Harrison Calmes, MD
• Chapter Twelve
  Every Physician Is a Leader
  By Asha Padmanabhan, MD
• Chapter Thirteen
  A Journey with Passion and Purpose
  By Eneida O. Roldan, MD, MPH, MBA

• Chapter Fourteen
  Having Fun While Trying to Have It All
  By Josephine Young, MD, MPH, MBA, FAAP
• Chapter Fifteen
  Pearls Are a Woman’s Necktie
  By Grace Terrell, MD

• Chapter Sixteen
  A Continuing Search for Challenge
  By Christine A. Petersen, MD, MBA
• Chapter Seventeen
  A Managed Care Journey: Learning from Yourself and Others
  By Susan Elizabeth Ford, MD, MBA
• Chapter Eighteen
  The “Other” Side
  By Deborah E. Hammond, MD
• Chapter Nineteen
  From Great Mentorship to Finding My True Purpose — The Greatest Lesson of All
  By Traci Thompson MD, MBA, CPE
• Chapter Twenty
  Medicine and Leadership: An Unplanned Journey
  By Eugenie Komives, MD
• Chapter Twenty-One
  Enduring Leadership
  By Barbara Le Tourneau, MD, MBA

• Chapter Twenty-Two
  Doing Well by Doing Good
  By Ellen Strahlman, MD, MHSc
• Chapter Twenty-Three
  Led by Passion
  By Elizabeth Garner, MD, MPH

• Chapter Twenty-Four
  Cardiothoracic Surgeon to Entrepreneur
  By Kathy E. Magliato, MD, MBA, FACS
• Chapter Twenty-Five
  Creating Your Own Version of Success
  By Kelly Z. Sennholz, MD
• Chapter Twenty-Six
  A Road Less Traveled
  by Deborah M. Shlian, MD, MBA
• Chapter Twenty-Seven
  Six Lessons I Wish I Had Learned Earlier
  By Kathleen Goonan, MD

• Chapter Twenty-Eight
  Persistence, Passion, and Resilience and How to Create Your Own Path
  By Laura Esserman, MD, MBA
• Chapter Twenty-Nine
  Empowering Ourselves and Others
  By Kathleen Neuzil, MD, MPH

• Chapter Thirty
  When the Detour Becomes the New Road
  By Eliza Chin, MD, MPH
• Chapter Thirty-One
  You Are Worthy of Your Dreams
  by Ana Pujols-McKee, MD

• Chapter Thirty-Two
  Life Has Taught Me to Strive for Purpose and Service
  By Daniela Sosa, MD
• Chapter Thirty-Three
  Learning to Embrace Imposter Syndrome
  By Janelis Gonzalez, MD
• Chapter Thirty-Four
  Coaching – What’s in It for You?
  By Margaret Cary, MD, MBA, MPH, PCC
• Chapter Thirty-Five
  Final Words
  By Deborah M. Shlian, MD, MBA
• Chapter Thirty-Six
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