What if one of the biggest leadership skills physicians need was never taught in medical school?

In this episode of PEMBA On Demand, Dr. Norm Chapin speaks with David Maslar, PhD, David McMillan, and Jim Rosenberg about why financial literacy has become essential for physician leaders. The conversation centers on Finance for Physician Leaders, a certificate program offered through the University of Tennessee Haslam College of Business in collaboration with PYA.

The episode begins with a question many physicians can relate to: after years of medical training, how many were ever formally taught how to read a financial statement, evaluate a contract, or understand the business implications of private equity in healthcare? Dr. Chapin notes that many clinicians are expected to navigate the financial side of medicine without ever receiving structured training in it.

David Maslar shares how his academic path led him into finance education and teaching. He serves as Academic Director of the Full-Time MBA program at Haslam College of Business, and his background includes graduate training in finance, economics, and applied mathematics. His official Haslam profile confirms his role with the Full-Time MBA program and his University of Missouri PhD background.

David McMillan discusses how his career evolved from financial statement auditing into healthcare consulting and advisory work. He explains how early work with hospitals and health systems led him into strategy modeling, transactions, valuation, compensation design, and other financial advisory areas. PYA confirms that McMillan serves as the firm’s President and has more than 30 years of advisory and consulting experience.

Jim Rosenberg brings the conversation back to the relationship between mission and financial sustainability. His Haslam profile describes his work with purpose-driven leaders and his role designing and delivering executive education programs for healthcare leaders. In the episode, he emphasizes that strong clinical care and financial sustainability do not have to be opposing forces. Instead, sustainable financial decisions can help organizations continue serving patients and communities over time.

The discussion explores why the gap between clinical training and financial knowledge matters more now than ever. The guests explain that healthcare has become more complex, with shifting reimbursement models, value-based care, private equity involvement, physician compensation questions, and organizational financial pressures. Physicians increasingly need enough financial vocabulary and context to participate meaningfully in leadership conversations.

A major theme of the episode is that the goal of finance education for physicians is not to turn doctors into accountants. Instead, the goal is to help physician leaders understand the “story behind the numbers” so they can ask better questions, evaluate tradeoffs, and communicate more effectively with CFOs, executives, boards, and practice leaders.

The guests also explain how the course is designed. Rather than offering a generic MBA finance class, the program uses healthcare-focused examples, live discussion, cases, small-group breakouts, and practical applications that physicians can bring back to their own organizations. The course begins with foundational financial vocabulary and then connects those concepts to real operational and clinical decisions.The episode also highlights the diversity of physicians drawn to the program. Participants include physicians from private practice, academic health systems, administrative roles, nonprofit organizations, for-profit organizations, and private equity-owned settings. This range reflects how broadly financial knowledge now applies across modern physician leadership.

By the end of the conversation, each guest shares what they hope physicians take away from the course: c...