Regina E. Herzlinger is the Nancy R. McPherson Professor of Business Administration at the Harvard Business School. She was the first woman to be tenured and chaired at Harvard Business School and the first to serve on many established and start up corporate health care/medical technology boards. She initiated the courses in nonprofit and health care at HBS and was the first faculty member to be selected by the students as their best instructor. With her husband, she has founded and sold successful medical technology firms whose innovations have saved countless lives.
All three of her trade health care books have been best sellers in their categories, recognized for their innovative research (Market-Driven Health Care, 1996; Consumer-Driven Health Care: Implications for Providers, Payers, and Policymakers, 2004; Who Killed Health Care? America’s $2 Trillion Medical Problem-and the Consumer-Driven Cure, 2007). Money dubbed her the “Godmother” of consumer-driven healthcare. Her work was key to introducing consumer-driven health plans and “focused health factories”, such as centers for chronic diseases. She is regularly named as one of the smartest people in healthcare by industry journals.
She teaches an HBS MBA course, Innovating in Health Care. Her book, Innovating in Health Care: A Toolkit for Entrepeneurs, for global life sciences, health insurance, digital health, and healthcare delivery innovators, will be published in 2020. To date, at least seven billion dollar healthcare businesses and some important nonprofits and healthcare financing firms have been created by students in the course.
Regi has been active in U.S. healthcare public policy. For example, her Wall Street Journal editorial “The IRS Can Save American Health Care” influenced an Executive Order: Promoting Healthcare Choice and Competition Across the United States, finalized June 2019, and a Wall Street Journal editorial in October 2018 by three U.S. cabinet secretaries that cited her, “New Health Options for Small-Business Employees”.
Her most recent research works include “The Case for the Public Option Over Medicare for All, Harvard Business Review (HBR)“, “How CEOs Can Solve America’s Corporate Cost and Quality Health Care Problem with Granular Adoption of Innovations (Forthcoming, HBR)”, “Addressing Regulatory and Educational Barriers to Venture Capital Investment in Health Care Delivery Innovation (In Review)”, and “Box 12, IRS W-2, to the Rescue: The Effect of Transferring Pre-Tax Employer-Sponsored Health Insurance Funds to Employees on After-Tax Income, Federal Income and Payroll Taxes, Health Insurance Premiums, and Health Care Costs (SSRN)”.
In 2018, she was awarded the prestigious ACHE Honorary Fellowship which represents the leaders of America’s hospitals and was one of the 100 Most Influential People in Healthcare – World Edition by Grupo Midia. In 2014, she launched a Harvard MOOC (Massive Open Online Course), on Innovating in Health Care and in 2013, a continuing series of conferences, “21st-Century Health Care Management Education: Confronting Challenges for Innovation with a Modern Curriculum,” sponsored by a charity she formed, GENiE (Global Educators Network for Health Care Innovation Education), which has supported the many schools that have introduced courses/programs on Innovating in Health Care.
Regi earned her BS degree at MIT and her Doctorate at HBS. She is married to her MIT classmate, George Herzlinger (MIT, B.S., Ph.D, physics). Their two children both graduated from Harvard. Susan is an Endocrinologist and Alex is a senior executive with a major medtech firm, after attending HBS and completing two tours of Iraq as a U.S. Infantry Captain. The Herzlingers have four adorable grandchildren.