Imagine your job involves transforming an entire behavioral healthcare system. What advanced degree would help you excel now and in the future? 

For Jennifer Joyce, (MSW ’10, EMBA in Healthcare ’20), the answer was Pitt’s Executive MBA in Healthcare.  

“I was considering a master of public health or a Ph.D. program,” says Joyce. “I didn’t know an MBA program so tailored to healthcare professionals existed. I joined the cohort a few months after learning about the program.” 

Part of Joyce’s job, as the behavioral health coordinator for the District of Columbia’s Department of Healthcare Finance, includes wrestling with complex issues such as increasing access and improving outcomes while simultaneously reducing the cost of healthcare.  

Taking Amtrak to Class

The structure of the Executive MBA in Healthcare — online coursework blended with in-person sessions held one weekend per month — made it easy for Joyce, who lives in Washington, D.C., to attend class. Sometimes she would take the Amtrak train to Pittsburgh and use that time to do homework. Other times, she drove. 

“If you are a career-driven person and you are passionate about what you do for a living, the class weekend is like a work vacation,” she says. “It was like a retreat to be in the room with great minds who are trying to solve the same problems you are trying to solve.” 

Cohort Shares Expertise

Not only did Joyce take a different mode of transportation to class, but she also had different professional experiences from the others in her cohort.  

A variety of clinicians and healthcare administrators — nurse practitioners, surgeons, healthcare supply chain management professionals, health insurance executives, physical therapists, etc. — enroll in this program. 

However, in Joyce’s cohort, there were only two social workers. “Sometimes people outside of the behavioral health world do not realize licensed social workers are actually top-level clinicians for practice environments,” she says. “My cohort learned social workers have a lot of training, education, and understanding of society-level dynamics.” 

Joyce is currently working through the policy and operational considerations of moving Medicaid in the District of Columbia to a more integrated and coordinated managed care system. Thanks to her cohort, she now has insights into the patient and provider experiences to take into consideration. 

Healthcare Innovation

Pittsburgh and Washington, D.C., are separated by less than 250 miles, yet Joyce feels they are worlds apart in their healthcare systems. 

“Many of the doctors and nurses who were in my cohort are working on the forefront of innovation,” says Joyce. “It was almost like I was traveling to the healthcare of the future for one weekend a month and learning from them.” 

In her day-to-day work, she frequently taps into what she learned in the courses like healthcare law, policy, and strategy. She credits the program for teaching her the language of business and for giving her practical insights into how some proposed reforms and innovations might work.