Management Consulting for Healthcare as a Career Path for Doctors

As a clinician, it might be perplexing to imagine yourself as a management consultant for healthcare.. However, there is a large chunk of doctors making the switch to this lucrative field. Going for an MBA after MBBS could take you a step ahead towards Management Consultancy. Management consultant business help organizations improve their performance and growth. They also provide creative solutions for the organization’s problems. Consulting for healthcare is an established career for clinicians for many years. The opportunities are vast, and the salary is competitive. This makes management consultancy a tangible option.

Overview of Management Consultancy

Management consultants are mainly hired to provide an outside eye into the organization’s problems. A large part of the work involved in management consulting involves identifying the strengths and weaknesses and making the company efficient and cost-effective. Management consultant business recommend practical solutions based on previous experiences, analysis and objectivity. They put forward new and challenging ideas that their clients have not seen before. Companies consult management consultant business and hire consultants because they require the specialized manpower lacking in their midst. Consulting for healthcare would solve similar problems for large healthcare organizations like hospitals groups, government, insurance, pharmaceutical, medtech and digital health.

Getting into consulting for healthcare

To become a management consultant business, you require a background in business. Most clinicians will have to pursue an MBA after MBBS or other medical degrees. S0me could get an entry master in public health also. Along with a degree, relevant work experience and skills are required to be hired by management consulting companies. Specialized management courses focusing purely on Management consultants business training also exist in Europe. The college where you pursue your MBA after MBBS is very important and hence research, shortlisting and application should be done with full focus. Also, it will be good to point out that while you might most likely be consulting for healthcare, your MBA after MBBS will enable you to be a Management Consultant business in other industries as well.

Roles and Responsibilities of a Management Consultant Business

Think about what doctors do? She diagnoses a problem in the patient, prescribes a remedy, and implements a treatment plan. This, in many ways, is what a management consultant does.

Varying roles in Consulting for healthcare

Healthcare consultants, like other management consultant businesses, collect data and analyze it to understand how their clients work. Consultants conduct direct meetings with the employees and other stakeholders. They lead members of their team in projects, while also recommending solutions to the client. They also create business proposals and presentations. They chart out plans to help their clients achieve tactical, operational, and strategic objectives.

Consultants actively network with companies all over the world. This allows them to be connected with people from a large variety of industries. MBA could be an interesting answer to after MBBS which course to take forward.

If you are focused on providing your consultancy services to a specific industry or functional area, you are usually referred to as specialist consultants. Others who are non restricted in offering their services are called generalist consultants. If consulting for healthcare clients will be your focus post MBA after MBBS, then you will be considered a specialist.

The job titles of consultants vary based on their specialization. Following are the job titles

Healthcare Consultant
Healthcare Management Consultant
Healthcare Market Research Consultant
Consultant – Public Health
Business Consultant
Project Manager
Business Analyst

Why Doctors Make Excellent Management Consultants

McKinsey & Company, one of the ‘Big Three’ management consultant business, sheds light on why many doctors are being hired by consulting companies. An article published in January 2015 by McKinsey explained that at its core, doctors are interested in bringing about institutional change. Many doctors chose management consulting as they felt restricted to bringing change in their clinical practice. As a result, they further opt for MBA after MBBS or any other medical degree. This led them to leave their clinical practice and enter a higher position that creates a larger impact.

The inherent skill set of doctors matches the profile of a management consultant. A doctor’s work is to provide solutions to her/his patient’s problems. Many a time doctors also manage to provide these solutions under immense pressure. So the challenging working environment of management consultant firms does not come as a surprise to most clinicians. Also, doctors can explain complex medical terms in simple and comprehensible words to the patient. However, medical terms are exchanged for statistics and numerical data in this field.

Management Consultants in Healthcare Sector

Physicians with a degree in management can easily gravitate towards a career in healthcare consulting. It can become a very natural career option. With their cross-sectional understanding and expertise, they can add immense value to healthcare management in hospitals and other medical facilities. In the healthcare sector, a physician with a degree in management will, in most cases, be preferred over a consultant without a medical degree. This gives clarity on after MBBS which course or career to avail.

Career Growth and Job Prospects of Consulting for healthcare

Management consulting provides a plethora of career opportunities for doctors in the corporate world, thus more and more young graduates are exploring MBA after MBBS or any other medical degree. It is more likely for an average doctor to have higher salary growth in management consulting than clinical practice. The salary guide for management consultants given by Case Interview in January 2020 explains why consultants receive competitive pay. It is simply because consultants cultivate professional relationships with their clients. The confidence and trust of a client in a particular management consultant business or firm facilitate their adequate compensation. Management Consultancy is one of the many non-clinical professions that offer higher remuneration than MBBS.

Along with salary growth, consultants also receive bonuses and benefits. Management consultants do not work night shifts, holidays, or weekends. However, the long working hours remain quite the same, A 2017 analysis of the Big Five management consulting companies reported an average of 95.8% in job satisfaction. As part of the job, consultants will be required to meet with different companies all over the world, thus providing travel opportunities while consulting for healthcare. A search for management consulting opportunities on LinkedIn revealed a total of about 105,500 results worldwide. Among those, more than 7,500 openings were located in India. As healthcare becomes more interdisciplinary and complex, the role of management consultants, in house and external, will become a vital part of organizational structure and decision making.

Conclusion

Monotony is unheard of in consulting careers. Every assignment presents a new challenge. Hence, management consultant business is a sound career option for doctors looking for exciting and competitive, fast-paced work. And all the hard work doesn’t go unrewarded in consulting for healthcare. Good salary packages and perks, and career growth are a given. Any doctor looking to make a name for herself in the corporate world has her path set out in the field of management consulting.