Training

Leading Quality Improvement: Essentials for Managers

Format:

Online

Start Date:

Aug 28, 2025

Sep 11, 2025

Duration:

16 Weeks

Fee:

$995*

Groups of 3 or more:

$846*

Download the program brochure

Don't miss out! Join our exclusive Informational Call with faculty on Thursday, July 24th, 2025, at 11:00 AM ET. Gain valuable insights and register now to secure your spot.

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*Prices are listed in USD. Group prices are listed as per-person.

In successful health care systems, managers play a vital role in meeting their organizations’ key strategic and improvement goals. The Institute for Healthcare Improvement's (IHI's) Leading Quality Improvement: Essentials for Managers uses innovative teaching methods to enhance engagement and deepen understanding of quality improvement to improve organizational efficiency.

Join our exclusive Informational Call with faculty on Thursday, July 24th, 2025, at 11:00 AM ET. Register now

Turn High-Level Objectives Into Action

As the bridge between senior leadership and the front lines, it is a manager’s job to turn high-level objectives into action at the department or unit level. Far too often, managers are not equipped or supported with the right skills, resources, or guidance to achieve their aims.

This program begins by guiding experienced managers through assessing their own leadership and work styles. It continues by building quality planning skills to identify, align, and prioritize improvement opportunities within a unit or care team through leveraging both qualitative and quantitative data. Participants will also learn basic quality improvement and quality control tools and methods, as well as strategies to engage front-line staff in each of these phases of the improvement journey.

What You'll Learn

After completing this online course, you will be able to:

Describe the skills, tools, and resources needed for mid-level managers to effectively lead quality improvement efforts at the local level.
Demonstrate how to link department-level improvement activities to the organization’s goals and overall strategic plan.
Apply approaches to quality planning, quality control, and quality improvement that can be used by mid-level managers to successfully partner with front-line staff and key stakeholders.

Throughout this virtual program, experts with a wealth of experience in improvement science, measurement, modeling, coaching, innovation, and making the business case for improvement will facilitate discussion about the key takeaways from the cases while teaching the skills managers need to excel in their jobs.

Who Should Attend

This program is for anyone who has direct reports and manages an organization's strategic goals at the microsystem or unit level, including:

Nurses
Physicians
Directors
Managers (Especially Risk, Quality, and/or Safety Managers)
Supervisors
Department heads
Health care administrators

Participants from any discipline — including leaders who work in health care and clinical settings, academia, industry, health care insurance, and other settings — are welcome to participate. This program is also particularly beneficial for those transitioning or desiring to transition from a clinical to a leadership role.

Session Faculty

Jesse McCall, MBA, Senior Director and Improvement Advisor, Institute for Healthcare Improvement (IHI), coaches individuals and organizations through the process of improvement which includes the data-driven identification of strategic improvement priorities, development of operational systems to support improvement, and the building of practical improvement capability necessary for staff to get results that matter. Jesse also has extensive experience in coaching organizations to engage clinical staff to reduce burnout and foster joy in work. He joined IHI in 2007 and over his tenure has designed, executed, and evaluated programs and projects around the world. He is also a Teaching Fellow at The Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health. Jesse has expertise in practical application of the science of improvement, staff engagement and wellness, program and product development, marketing and communications, customer relationship management, and large-scale initiative operations. He received his undergraduate degree in Business Administration from Northeastern University in Boston and MBA from the UMASS Amherst Isenberg School of Management.

Marianne Smith, MAS-PSHQ, BSN, RN, CPPS, Project Director, Institute for Healthcare Improvement (IHI), joined IHI in 2023 with over 25 years of health care experience in emergency nursing, patient experience, and patient safety. She is dedicated to integrating the tenets of high reliability and human factors engineering in her work to transform and ensure safe, high-quality, and equitable care in diverse environments. Marianne worked extensively as a travel RN across the US, relocating to Australia as an advanced practice and trauma RN in the Sydney Southwest Area Health System. Returning to the US, she devoted nearly a decade to UW Medicine Valley Medical Center in Seattle, where she led improvement initiatives in patient experience, developed novel processes to manage COVID assessment and tracking, and managed operations for the organization’s TeamSTEPPS program, in addition to facilitating root cause analyses and improvement projects to address serious patient safety events. In addition to her Certified Professional in Patient Safety credential, Marianne received her BSN from the University of Michigan School of Nursing and her MAS in Patient Safety and Healthcare Quality from Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health.

Disclaimer: Consistent with the IHI’s policy, faculty for this program are expected to disclose at the beginning of their presentation(s) any economic or other personal interests that create, or may be perceived as creating, a conflict related to the material discussed. The intent of this disclosure is not to prevent a speaker with a significant financial or other relationship from making a presentation, but rather to provide listeners with information on which they can make their own judgments.

Unless otherwise noted below, each presenter provided full disclosure information, does not intend to discuss an unapproved/investigative use of a commercial product/device, and has no significant financial relationship(s) to disclose. If unapproved uses of products are discussed, presenters are expected to disclose this to participants.

Making the Case: Download the Justification Letter to provide high-level information on the Leading Quality Improvement: Essentials for Managers program to your leadership.

Session Agenda

The program consists of 8 online lessons and 8 live hour-long webinars. The agenda for the August 2025 offering is available to download:

IHI Leading Quality Improvement August 2025 High-Level Agenda

Continuing Education

In support of improving patient care, the Institute for Healthcare Improvement is jointly accredited by the Accreditation Council for Continuing Medical Education (ACCME), the Accreditation Council for Pharmacy Education (ACPE), and the American Nurses Credentialing Center (ANCC), to provide continuing education for the health care team.

Continuing education credits for this program are still being finalized and will be updated shortly.

A growing list of countries accept ACCME-accredited education. 

Upon completion of this program, you will be able to:

Define Whole System Quality and the leadership principles required to support it.
Explain the utility of improvement science for health care managers.
Compare the culture in your local area of work to recommendations for a culture of safety.
Apply strategies to assist in learning about and understanding what really matters to patients and support networks, the local community, and the health care force.

Instructions

In order to be eligible for a continuing education certificate, attendees must complete the online evaluation within 30 days of the continuing education activity. After this period, you will be unable to receive a certificate.

Continuing education credits will not be awarded for non-educational activities, including (but not limited to) meals, breaks and receptions.

Planning Committee

Jesse McCall, MBA, Senior Director, IHI
Marianne Smith, RN, Director, IHI
Pierre Barker, MD, Chief Scientific Officer, IHI
Lauren Cameron, Program Manager, IHI
Brandon Aquino, Marketing Coordinator, IHI

Disclosure: None of the planners, presenters, or staff for this educational activity have relevant financial relationship(s) to disclose with ineligible companies whose primary business is producing, marketing, selling, re-selling, or distributing healthcare products used by or on patients.

Fees & Scholarships

Registration Rates

Includes 8 online lessons and 8 live hour-long webinars to reinforce, discuss, and apply content covered during the online lessons. Prices are listed in USD.

Regular rate: $995 per person

Groups of 3 or more: $846 per person
Register a group

Scholarships

IHI is pleased to offer a limited number of 25% and 100% scholarships to assist with program registration costs for those working in:  

Independent, United States Federally Qualified Health Centers (FQHCs) that are not affiliated with a hospital  or health system  
Critical Access Hospitals  
Independent practices with fewer than 20 physicians  
Hospitals with fewer than 50 beds  
Members of America's Essential Hospitals  
501(c)(3) organization with a defined operating budget of less than $5 million, serving community-based populations  
Ministries of Health  
Faith-based health institutions   
Skilled Nursing Facilities

To apply for a scholarship, please complete the online Scholarship Application by August 8, 2025. IHI will not consider applications submitted after this date. Scholarship decisions will be announced by August 15, 2025.

All Scholarships are reviewed on an individual basis. If multiple individuals from the same organization wish to apply for a scholarship, each individual must submit an application.   

To ensure equal distribution of funds, all scholarship applications are reviewed using the same scoring criteria. All awarded amounts are final.  

Please note, scholarships are available for program registration costs only, and do not cover travel, food, or accommodation costs associated with attending a program.   

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Logistics

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Leading Quality Improvement: Essentials for Managers