As populations grow older and people become increasingly health conscious, the global demand for skillful medical professionals is accelerating. In general, there is high demand for healthcare workers in a broad variety of specializations. In particular, there is an urgent need for strong leadership at hospitals and other healthcare facilities around the globe.
Large numbers of women are employed in the healthcare industry, but women are grossly under-represented in top management positions. If employers in the healthcare industry hope to fill all their future vacancies with competent managers, it would be ideal for them to empower greater numbers of women to rise through the ranks and assume positions of leadership.
Not all female healthcare workers aspire to be managers — but if you are a female healthcare professional who wants to become a medical administrator, the following 3 tips could help you to achieve that goal:
1. Seek Mentorship
In order to be an effective leader, you’ll need to have role models. Any healthcare professional who hopes to advance to a management role will need to have a chance to interact with high-level executives.
You’re likely to get nowhere if you wait around for others to volunteer to mentor you. Since top-level executives aren’t mind readers, they will have no idea of your aspirations unless you do your part to make them aware of them. You will need to be proactive about reaching out to others and seeking mentorship.
2. Obtain Management Training
In the United States, medical administrators typically need to secure at least a bachelor’s degree. A graduate degree isn’t a legal requirement in most US locations, but it would be beneficial to get one anyway due to intense competition for the best administrative jobs.
A 2-3 year degree program focused on healthcare administration would be ideal for helping you to qualify for management roles in hospitals and other healthcare facilities. After that, you can even enroll in an MHA degree program to further expand your qualifications. If you’re a nurse, and you’d like to work as a nurse practitioner, a master’s degree in one of the APRN roles might be a better choice. Either way, an advanced degree can empower you with the credentials, confidence and skills you’ll need to be taken seriously when you interview for leadership roles. Some nursing skills that are sometimes easily dismissed are the skills that can mean the difference between a good nurse and an exceptional nurse
3. When Problems Arise, Seek Resolutions
Although the workforce in healthcare is predominantly female, sometimes the women working in this industry still face issues with discrimination and harassment. This is wrong and unjust, but it happens.
Industry experts have concluded that a talent development and retention problem has been a significant contributing factor resulting in a lack of women in key leadership roles in healthcare. Discrimination and harassment are not the only reasons for the talent retention problem, but they do contribute to the situation.
If you’re a female healthcare professional, these are issues that you may have to deal with at some point in your career. If you plan to become a medical administrator, it will be especially important for you to have an understanding of how to handle workplace harassment issues. You will need to be proactive about seeking resolutions when these sorts of problems, and others, arise.
These 3 tips can help to guide you past some of the most common pitfalls that women in healthcare face as they seek leadership roles. Taking action in each of these 3 areas could help you break through the proverbial glass ceiling to achieve the leadership role you desire.
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Interesting related article: “Women-run businesses boost the global economy.”