Physician Executives in Managed Care: Characteristics and Job Involvement Across Two Career Stages

Abstract

This paper examines characteristics, job involvement, and career stage differences among 294 physician executives working in managed care settings. The following research questions guide the study: What types of physicians are currently in managerial roles in these settings? What role (if any) does medical career stage play in physician executives' professional and job-related attitudes? What factors are related to physician executives' involvement in their management roles? Several observations are made from the findings. First, contemporary physician executives see management as an exciting alternative career that involves multiple work loyalties, weaker beliefs in traditional professional values, and the sacrifice of significant amounts of clinical for management work. Second, these trends are more pronounced for physician executives at earlier points in their medical careers, although their work loyalties to profession and employing organization are weaker than older physician executives' loyalties. Younger individuals' involvement in management work, more than older individuals' involvement, appears to depend upon the surrounding work climate within the organization. Finally, the amount of time spent by physician executives as clinicians is inversely related to how psychologically attached they are to management, regardless of career stage.