Health Care Administration Leadership and Management (HALM) Fellowship

Overview

The Health Care Administration Leadership and Management (HALM) fellowship is an ACGME-accredited training program at Cleveland Clinic. Housed within the Education Institute and offered by the Graduate Medical Education Department, the program is a two-year fellowship combining block, longitudinal and project-based learning.

The aim of the Cleveland Clinic HALM fellowship is to prepare early-career physicians to successfully lead in today’s complex healthcare environment by providing them with a personalized program of leadership skills development along with broad knowledge and experience across multiple domains of health system operations. This experience will enable them to be successful leaders in the areas of their interest and choice, be it patient care delivery, education or research.

Fellows will gain exposure to key leadership and operational domains across the Cleveland Clinic enterprise including operations, finance, human resources, compliance, legal and informatics. There is a strong emphasis on quality, safety, patient experience and continuous improvement. Fellows will have the opportunity to spend time at Cleveland Clinic locations outside of Northeast Ohio including international sites.

How to Apply

Applications are now closed for the 2024 academic year.

The first group of HALM fellows started July 1, 2024, and will end on June 30, 2026.

The application window for the 2026 academic year will open in late 2025. Please direct any questions to Donna Baumiller, MS, C-TAGME.

Eligibility

This two‐year fellowship is accredited by the ACGME and administered by Graduate Medical Education. 

Given the nature of this fellowship, privileges as a limited clinical practitioner in the applicant’s specialty area at Cleveland Clinic is a requirement. 

Please direct any questions to Donna Baumiller, MS, C-TAGME.

Time Commitment and Salary

Much of the work during the two-year fellowship is self‐directed and will require time for completion of assignments, fellowship projects and capstone work. Fellows are required to receive no less than 50% release time from their departments/institutes (as an appointed limited clinical practitioner) to devote to fellowship projects, which should be discussed with department/institute leadership as a condition of applying. A letter of support from the candidate’s current or future department or institute chair will be required as part of the application. 

The following mixed model formula is used to calculate the fellow’s salary during the two-year fellowship: 50% is commensurate with the fellow’s assumed PGY level (view the PGY salary table) and paid by GME, with the other portion of the salary determined by the fellow’s clinical institute.

Curriculum

This is a two‐year fellowship combining block, longitudinal and project-based learning.

Example of Monthly Block Schedule: Year 1 

*Fellows will spend up to 50% of their time in independent practice. This practice is outside the scope of the HALM fellowship, as the fellows are already fully trained in their respective clinical specialties.

*Fellows receive 20 days of vacation per academic year, usually taken during elective rotations.

Example of Monthly Block Schedule: Year 2 

*Fellows will spend up to 50% of their time in independent practice. This practice is outside the scope of the HALM fellowship, as the fellows are already fully trained in their respective clinical specialties.

*Fellows receive 20 days of vacation per academic year, usually taken during elective rotations.

Committee Membership/Leadership

As part of the HALM fellowship, trainees are exposed to longitudinal observation and continued involvement in several enterprise-level committees including:

Governance & Finance

• Board of Governors / Medical Executive Committee (BOG/MEC) and subcommittees

• Cleveland Clinic Board of Directors (BoD) and subcommittees
• Tiered daily huddles

Quality & Accreditation

• Enterprise Quality Leadership Team

• Enterprise Safety Leadership Team
• Continuous Improvement (CI) Physician Collaborative 

Operations

• Enterprise Risk Committee

• Capital Committee

Legal & Compliance

• Compliance Committee 

Projects and Capstone

Fellows will have the opportunity to develop and select organization-wide projects for which they will have responsibility during the first two months of the fellowship. This introductory part of the curriculum will orient the fellow to all aspects of healthcare operations that are specific to Cleveland Clinic. As part of this process, fellows will have the opportunity to meet one-on-one with several leaders from different administrative departments across the enterprise. In collaboration with these leaders, fellows will identify projects that are of particular interest to them, identify executive project sponsors and mentors, and develop a timeline for their project(s). 

As fellows will be drawn from a variety of medical disciplines and will come to the fellowship with a variety of background experiences, their unique specialization and interests will be key drivers of project selection. Input will also be sought from the chairs and other leaders in their respective clinical departments. 

In addition to fellow-led project selection, the program team will reach out to executive-level leaders in clinical operations; quality and safety; professional staff affairs (Cleveland Clinic’s human resources function for physicians and scientists); and other areas to identify additional projects or initiatives that would be appropriate for fellows to lead. 

This dual approach will ensure that fellows select capstone projects that reflect both their own interest as well as the critical needs of the organization, while also allowing for progressive responsibility over tasks and processes relative to their projects throughout the fellowship 

Capstone projects will be selected based on their importance in addressing a critical improvement opportunity for the organization. The project will have at least one executive team member as an executive sponsor, along with appropriate administrative and project management support from faculty and teams with which the fellow has interacted on a day-to-day basis while working and leading on rotations in areas relevant to their project focus. 

Fellows will be responsible for prioritizing time to work on their capstone project(s) throughout their fellowship. They will also have the flexibility to use elective time as well as dedicated time during two capstone months in their second year to allow them to complete, assess and prepare their scholarly activity for publication and / or presentation. The involvement of a senior executive leader as well as other senior physician and non-physician leaders will help ensure that the fellow has appropriate support, feedback and organizational commitment to enable the project to be successfully completed.

Our Team

James Gutierrez, MD, MSc
Chief, Primary Care Institute
Program Director

James Stoller, MD, MS
Chairman, Education Institute
Associate Program Director

Jessica Donato, MD
Staff Hospitalist
Associate Program Director

Donna Baumiller, MS, C-TAGME
Program Manager