Academic health systems (AHSs) are growing rapidly through mergers, affiliations, and partnerships. But expanding is one thing; becoming a cohesive, high-performing enterprise is another.
This article was written by the Becker’s Healthcare editorial team based on the AMC Leadership Forum, a series sponsored by ECG, at the Becker’s Hospital Review 15th Annual Meeting. It captures insights from 12 leading academic health systems and outlines four strategic imperatives driving the transformation to “systemness”:
- Leadership Alignment and Governance: AMC leaders emphasize the need to align boards, executives, and clinical leaders around a singular purpose, and then operationalize it.
- Clinical Integration and Care Access: AMCs need to decentralize care while preserving quality and academic excellence.
- Strengthening the Academic Mission: Growth must amplify, not dilute, the academic mission.
- Fostering Culture through Effective Change Management: Integration efforts will fail without proactive communication, transparency, and shared purpose.