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Individual Course

Health Care Strategy

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Course Length

5 weeks

4-6 hours per week

Featuring faculty from:

Harvard Business School

Certificate Price:

$ 1,600

Enroll by Jul 9, 2026

Enroll Now

Certificate Price:

$ 1,600

Enroll by Jul 9, 2026

Enroll Now

In this course, Harvard Business School faculty teach learners to align business strategy with the challenges and structures of the health care industry in the United States.

What can business strategy teach us about health care innovation in the United States? Why is a strategic vision important to implement in health care organizations? How do health care providers and institutions create value — and, more importantly, how do they capture value?

When you think of health care organizations, do the terms sustainable advantage or strategic differentiation come to mind? In an industry with increasing competition and innovation, leaders of U.S. health care organizations, and those delivering care, need to understand how their success depends on these key principles. This includes understanding health care business strategy and market development, the forces that make it easy or difficult to capture value, and how you can successfully compete against rivals. You must go beyond creating value to develop the critical thinking and analytical skills to develop a health care business strategy which will allow you to evaluate the needs of your business, optimize business decisions, and develop new or innovative health care ventures.

Self-Guided

Harvard Online

Industries:

  • Health Care
  • Consulting
  • Pharmaceuticals
  • Technology
  • Tracy Lyn De S.
  • Payam T.
  • Holly D.

Global Learning Community

  • Learn from real case studies
  • Do it on your own time
  • Get a certificate, add it to your resume
  • Be part of the Harvard Community
Data Science for Business values

Syllabus

Health Care Strategy features authentic business examples, interactive lessons, and conversations with industry experts. This course will help you align the principles of business strategy with the unique challenges and structures of health care organizations, enabling you to create and capture value for your organization, and lead your organization to sustainability. Learning requirements: There are no prerequisites to enroll in this course. To earn a Certificate of Completion from Harvard Online, participants must thoughtfully complete modules 1-4, including satisfactory completion of the associated quizzes, by stated deadlines.

Download Full Syllabus

Faculty

Industry Experts

Your Instructor

Leemore Dafny

Bruce V. Rauner Professor of Business Administration at the Harvard Business School

Leemore Dafny is the Bruce V. Rauner Professor of Business Administration at the Harvard Business School, where she teaches courses in healthcare strategy and co-directs to PhD Program in Business Economics. Professor Dafny also serves on the faculties of the John F. Kennedy School of Government and the interdisciplinary Program in Health Policy.

Industry Expert

Beth Zoneraich

CEO of a Health Care Fertility Organization

Beth Zoneraich is the CEO of a health care fertility organization, however did not begin her career in the health care industry. Explore how business analysis aided her in entering the health care business.

Industry Expert

Kevin Tabb

CEO of Beth Israel Lahey Health

Kevin Tabb is the CEO of Beth Israel Lahey Health, a system of academic and teaching hospitals in Massachusetts. He will share his first hand experience on how business strategy is affecting the health care industry.

Affiliations are listed for identification purposes only.

Industry Expert

Dr. Jorge Plutzky

Director of The Vascular Disease Prevention Program at Harvard Medical School

Dr. Jorge Plutzky is the Director of The Vascular Disease Prevention Program and on faculty at Harvard Medical School. As an expert on capturing value in competitive health care markets, he will describe his methods and strategies.

I would highly recommend it to anyone starting out in the health care industry as a business leader. I particularly enjoyed the case studies because it gave real world application examples of how business is done. I also learned about pioneers that I was able to discuss with my manager at work.

Tracy Lyn De S.

Consultant

I enjoyed the style of presentation for this online course... The questions asked for discussions and peer-engagement platform helped the course look like a live lecture, while participants benefit from the comfort of their personalized schedules.

Payam T.

Lead Data Analyst

It is super valuable to see health care from another perspective other than clinically, and to realize that clinical and financial goals can align with the right people working together.

Holly D.

Health Care Strategy Learner

I thought this was an amazing course with extremely relevant content. Coming from the clinical support and product development side of medical device startup companies, this course really opened my eyes to some of the decisions that the c-suite individuals would make on the business side.

Michael A.

Product Specialist

This course was extremely significant in my learning about healthcare business industry standards, expectations, and ways to implement to healthcare strategy into a consulting role, which is what I am moving into. This course sets a phenomenal foundation in to my professional pivot into this role.

Jane C.

Nurse Care Coordination

I already had some theoretical and practical knowledge of the topics covered in the course. However, the way the content is given... and the participation stimulated by the methodology, expanded my knowledge and my vision on the subject. Real cases are good for understanding and learning the topics. A real feast.

Adelino de M. F.

Medical Director

If you are looking to learn the basic dynamics of the health care industry as well as understand how to define a strategy to be successful in improving patient outcomes and reducing overall health care costs, then this is the class for you.

Joshua M.

Health Care Strategy Learner

The industry analysis and positioning model, as well as the case studies, inspired me to optimize my intervention design for public health care delivery in Nigeria.

Peter O.

I wanted to broaden my understanding of healthcare strategy and then specifically focused on value creation. This course met my goals excellently and broadened my understanding of market movements.

Elise van Z.

Executive Director

This course helped me establish a pretty solid foundation of the Payer-Provider model and how certain sectors can affect the upstream and downstream companies. This has certainly widen my view of the US Healthcare and certainly triggered some out of the box ideas.

Marianne C.

This course has provided me with the framework necessary to make strategic decisions within my organization, enabling me to shape initiatives that drive positive upstream impacts. With these insights, I'm now equipped to align decisions with broader organizational goals, improve operational efficiency, and create sustainable growth across all levels.

Erika F.

Community Outreach Manager

I was eager to take this course in order to progress in my career.

Amr

Unlock Exclusive Webinar Replays with Your Enrollment

When you enroll in Health Care Strategy—or any course in the Health Care Leadership series—you’ll gain access to an exclusive, on-demand library of webinars available only to enrolled Harvard Online learners. Hear from Data Science for Business faculty Yael Grushka-Cockayne in Harnessing AI in Business, learn from Professor Dustin Tingley in Data Science in the AI Era, and explore many more expert-led sessions. Explore all of our enrolled learner and past participant benefits. Explore all of our enrolled learner and past participant benefits.

Learning Path in this topic

Health Care Leadership

Health Care Leadership courses are developed with health care professionals in mind. Harvard University faculty guides you through topics with a specific focus on the current state of the US health care system and how you can apply innovative strategies to make improvements within your organization.

See learning path
Learning Path Health Care

4 Courses available

Reducing Racial Disparities in Health Care

May 27, 2026 • 4–5 hours per week

Deliver high-quality health care to all through organizational change

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  • +2
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Reducing Racial Disparities in Health Care

Innovations in Teamwork for Health Care

Jul 1, 2026 • 6–9 hours per week

Learn strategy implementation for teamwork in health care

  • Health Care
  • Pharmaceuticals
  • +2
  • Featured
  • Certificate
Innovations in Teamwork for Health Care

Health Care Economics

May 27, 2026 • 3-4 hours a week

Learn what economic forces are shaping the US health care sector

  • Health Care
  • Government
  • +2
  • Featured
  • Certificate
Health Care Economics

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Past Participant Discounts

Learners who have enrolled in at least one qualifying Harvard Online program can receive a 30% discount, automatically applied to the Program Fee upon time of payment.

Learners who have earned a verified certificate for a HarvardX course hosted on the edX platform are eligible to receive a 30% discount using a discount code. Please check your email for a code or contact us.

Nonprofit, Government, Military, and Education Discounts

Eligibility is determined by a prospective learner’s email address, ending in .org, .gov, .mil, or .edu. Interested learners can apply below for the discount and, if eligible, will receive a promo code to enter when completing payment information to enroll in a Harvard Online program.

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FAQs

We offer 30% discounts to past participants of select Harvard Online courses. We also offer discounts on select courses to learners who work in nonprofits, government, military, or education, or are U.S. veterans. You can find more information about current discounts and eligibility on our course policies and discounts page.

Apply for a Discount

Once you've earned your Certificate of Completion, list it on your resume along with the date of completion:

Harvard Online

Certificate in Health Care Strategy

[Cohort Start Month and Year]

List your certificate on your LinkedIn profile under "Education" as follows:

School: Harvard Online

Dates Attended: [The year you participated in the program]

Degree: Other; Certificate in Health Care Strategy

Field of Study: Leave blank

Grade: Complete

Activities and Societies: Leave blank

For the program description on LinkedIn, please use the following:

Health Care Strategy is an online course that will help you align the principles of business strategy with the unique challenges and structures of health care organizations.

You are expected to complete all coursework in a thoughtful and timely way. This includes completing the modules and fully answering the questions in each module between the course start and end dates so that the cohort can move through the course at a similar pace and benefit from social learning opportunities. ⁠In addition to completing modules and assignments, you are expected to provide feedback on other learners’ reflections and contribute to discussions on the platform.

⁠You can set your own daily or weekly routine and adjust it as needed, but to receive your certificate you must complete all modules and assignments by the stated course end date. Learners who do not complete the course requirements will not receive a certificate and will not be eligible to retake the course. No letter grades are assigned for this course; your participation is evaluated on a complete or incomplete basis.

For detailed information about technology and bandwidth requirements, please see our full Harvard Online FAQs.

Upon successful completion of this program, you will receive a digital Certificate of Completion from Harvard Online. Our team reviews all participant coursework after the final deadline in your course, and, once eligibility is confirmed, your Certified Electronic Credential will be delivered to your email address.

You will have access to the materials in every prior module as you progress through the program. Access to course materials and the course platform ends 60 days after the final deadline in the program.

At the end of the course, you will be able to download a PDF summary highlighting key concepts that were introduced throughout the course. We hope the summary document will serve as a helpful resource after you finish the course.

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