The proposed Master of Health Industry Administration (MHIA) program is designed to address an unfilled need in post-graduate management education – to increase the available pool of highly capable professionals to fill the growing demand in the burgeoning healthcare industry. Combining Schulich’s strength of high-quality management education with specialized expertise in the field of healthcare administration, the proposed 12-month (3-term) full-time program will be unique in both Ontario and Canada and will offer explicitly designed courses for a changing healthcare industry.

The mission of the program is to prepare students with the leadership and management skills needed to thrive and make a difference in a transformational industry, in both the public and private spheres, and to help build the next generation of healthcare leaders for emerging global challenges and the workforce of tomorrow. Students will receive training in health informatics, supply chain management, epidemiology, quality of healthcare, performance metrics, public policy, and strategy, all in addition to the traditional foundational disciplines such as accounting, finance, marketing, strategy, organizational behavior, and management of information systems.

The MHIA will serve two sets of potential students. Apart from the traditional direct entry undergraduate, the program will be open to healthcare practitioners who are currently working in entry-level facets of healthcare administration but who wish to progress to higher and broader organizational leadership roles in health administration. The MHIA can therefore be seen as an intermediate step on a path of lifelong learning that may, at a later stage, include enrolment in an MBA or EMBA program to complement graduates’ skills with those required for senior and more generalized leadership positions.

Every MHIA student will take a 12-week 3.00 credit capstone course in which they will consult with a real-world organization in teams of five students to address an issue of strategic importance to the organization. The course, titled Strategy Consulting Study in Healthcare (HIMP 6100 3.00), consists of a single-deliverable consulting assignment in which students engage with a real private or public sector healthcare-focused organization to analyze an existing organizational issue and prepare a report containing detailed analysis and recommendations.

Additionally, students may opt to complete a competitive internship with one of the School’s partner organizations.