A new program is being developed to foster the next cohort of health system leaders. The Athlete Health Leadership Program (AHLP) is a new initiative tailored to help professional athletes transition into careers in health administration and management.
By: Marielle Boutin
The program, which is launching through the Master of Health Science in Health Administration (MHSc) at IHPME, will be the first of its kind in Canada. Plans for the first cohort are in motion, with calls to potential applicants being sent out to the Canadian Football League Players’ Association (CFLPA), the official union representing Canadian Football League (CFL) players.
Motivated by the ongoing transformation of Canada’s health system and growing systemic challenges, the AHLP was conceived as a means to explore new types of leaders, leveraging the collaboration, tenacity, resiliency, and other critical skills that elite athletes develop throughout their careers.
“Similar to the opportunity that exists when talented individuals enter health leadership from other industries, the AHLP aims to find these high-level skillsets a home in health care, tackling health system challenges with outside the box thinking and unique soft skills to lead change,” says Ryan Hinds, Director of Equity, Diversity and Inclusion at the Dalla Lana School of Public Health.
In addition to spearheading this initiative, Hinds is also a former CFL player and MHSc Health Administration alumnus. Combined with the exceptional soft skills of CFL athletes, this made launching the program with this audience in mind a logical choice.
“There has been a trend in the past decade or so which has seen many college and other high-level athletes gravitating towards the MHSc Health Administration program,” says Program Director Karen Born. “We wanted to make a clearer connection between the excellent team competencies professional athletes have and our competency-driven approach to health administration education.”
According to Born, this is a unique opportunity to leverage the strengths of a previously untapped pool of applicants and add to the already varied cohort of existing students in the MHSc program.
The AHLP aligns with one of the MHSc strengths of bringing diverse and innovative minds to health leadership. Individuals who are high performance athletes can contribute their unique competencies to group work and activities, which are a cornerstone of the program.
Karen Born, MHSc Program Director
The MHSc is designed for working professionals, combining core foundations of health leadership with applied learning to equip learners with real-world leadership skills without cutting into their careers.
The AHLP was designed with this in mind, offering athletes a flexible pathway into possible careers in health administration, beginning with Canada’s Health System and Leadership Bridging Series. The synchronous sessions, delivered by leading faculty at IHPME, will cover a wide range of topics such as policy frameworks, contemporary leadership challenges, and health economics. The series will be followed by guided application support for the MHSc program, after which successful applicants will receive a summer refresher before officially starting their program in the Fall.
As with all MHSc students, learners in the program will also have access to a supportive network of faculty, as well as a dedicated mentor through the Senior Fellow Program.
While the first cohort of the AHLP will be centred on recruiting CFL athletes, Prof. Born is keen on expanding the program to other athletic communities.
“The future looks like one where excellence in sports and athletic performance translates into a meaningful career drawing on the competencies that make athletes so successful on the field and in the game into driving change in health care,” says Born.
A certainty in today’s health landscape is its propensity to evolve and change. The vast health sector needs diversity and the AHLP is poised to be an important catalyst in the creation of strong leaders who are undeterred by complex challenges.
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Communications
Marielle Boutin
Email Address: ihpme.communications@utoronto.ca