"Running an academic health system is like managing a three-dimensional cube with matricies, nodes, and decision-making knots—and a red cherry on top: the CEO. If you don't activate the network and allow for shared ownership, the cube will eventually reject the leader or break apart."
Academic medical centers (AMCs) are navigating a period of sustained complexity, shaped by converging financial pressures, workforce dynamics, policy uncertainty, and rising expectations of leadership. As a result, the AMC CEO role is expanding in scope and intensity, requiring leaders to operate across increasingly distributed, multi‑mission enterprises while maintaining clarity, credibility, and purpose.
Developed in partnership with Vizient, Inc., this research draws on peer‑informed perspectives from the Vizient AMC CEO Network to explore how leaders are navigating these conditions in practice. Rather than advancing a single leadership model, the report surfaces patterns and insights that illuminate how impactful AMC CEOs are adapting their leadership approach while exercising enduring principles under more demanding conditions.
This Report Offers
- A structured examination of the forces reshaping the AMC CEO role, and why growing complexity is changing how leadership must be exercised, not just what leaders are responsible for
- Insight into the leadership stance and essential competencies that enable effectiveness in highly matrixed, multi‑stakeholder academic medical environments
- An exploration of how C‑suite teams function as critical multipliers of leadership impact, with attention to team culture and alignment, executive development and retention, and CEO succession
- A forward‑looking synthesis that highlights how AMC CEOs are applying enduring leadership principles with greater range, judgment, and adaptability
Whether you are a current AMC CEO, a member of the executive team or board, or a leader preparing for expanded responsibility, this report offers a grounded perspective on what it takes to lead academic medicine through transformation.
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AMC CEO Report 2026
Contributors
Robert W. Cannon, President at BJC Health System East Region (BJC HealthCare)
John D. Couris, President and Chief Executive Officer at Tampa General Hospital, and President and Chief Executive Officer at Florida Health Sciences Center
John Fernandez, President and Chief Executive Officer at Brown University Health
Carol A. Gomes, Chief Executive Officer and Chief Operating Officer at Stony Brook University Hospital
Thomas M. Gronow, EdD, President and Chief Executive Officer at University of Colorado Hospital
Rodney B. Hanners, Chief Executive Officer at Keck Medicine of University of Southern California
Peter Healy, Divisional President at Metro Boston for Beth Israel Lahey Health, and President at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center
Wendy Horton, PharmD, Senior Vice President and President of Adult Services at UCSF Health
Steve Leffler, MD, Chief Executive Officer at University of Vermont Health, and President and Chief Operating Officer at University of Vermont Medical Center
Ric Ransom, JD, Chief Executive Officer at University of Missouri Health Care
Cory D. Shaw, President and Chief Executive Officer at UC Health
