Marc B. Scher, FHFMA, CPA

In a year when my theme is Sempre Avanti (Always Forward), I now find myself looking back. It’s humbling for me to reflect on the ways I’ve personally been embraced by members and leaders at HFMA events across the country. It’s especially meaningful to know that the inspiration for this theme — the bravery and…

One theme I’m hearing coming out of the J.P. Morgan (JPM) Healthcare Conference and recent HFMA chapter conferences is strategic leadership. It’s a concept that Harvard Business Review describes as understanding yourself, your organization’s goals and the situation at hand, and bringing the appropriate expertise to bear to support success.a For healthcare finance leaders navigating…

Bloomberg Philanthropies is investing in youth to address healthcare's talent shortage, creating "healthcare high schools" in 10 cities across the country, which combine classroom learning with hands-on experience and the opportunity to earn industry certifications and college credit.

If innovation is key to moving forward as an industry and as an organization, so is the ability to nurture strong relationships. It’s a skill that is crucial to navigating payer-provider relations, where the stakes can mean the difference between a patient being able to access care locally and having to travel long distances for…

During one of my favorite presentations at HFMA’s Annual Conference, healthcare entrepreneur and best-selling author Suneel Gupta described Betty Crocker’s unexpectedly bumpy path to launching an instant cake mix.  Betty Crocker believed instant cake mixes were destined to become a best-selling product. Leaders had done the research, and they put a lot of marketing behind…

It was a training camp that even the most elite athletes struggled to endure: Camp Hale, a WWII winter training ground in central Colorado. The valley floor alone sits at an elevation of 9,200 feet, while the elevation of the mountain ridges where the U.S. Army trained skiers in combat reached nearly 13,000 feet. It’s…