Business Health Care Leadership certificate students include local physicians and health care professionals.

Call it Management 101 with a medical twist.

Fourteen local doctors and health services professionals had the opportunity to learn how they can apply business principles to the health-care industry through a new Business Health Care Leadership certificate, offered jointly by the Goodman School of Business’s Centre for Innovation, Management and Enterprise Education (CIMEE), and the Niagara Regional Campus of McMaster University’s Michael G. DeGroote School of Medicine.

The continuing education program, which held its final seminar June 25, consisted of six seminars that focused on how to integrate the principles of business leaders – like change management, adaptive leadership, quality improvement and personal branding – into the health care sector.

For Dr. Neil Maharaj, a Niagara Falls-based respirologist, the seminar on “Developing a service attitude and building a service culture” has motivated him to apply some of the practical and useful tips to his own medical practice.

“Sometimes we lose sight of the importance of service in our field,” Dr. Maharaj said about the impact the course had on his own medical practice.

He’s pleased with his overall experience with the program.

“You get a sense of leadership from a business perspective, not just a medical perspective.”

The designed program was a first-time collaboration between CIMEE and the Niagara Regional Campus of McMaster’s medical school. The seminar facilitators included professors from the Goodman School of Business and Faculty of Applied Health Sciences as well as instructors from McMaster University.