Accelerating Physician Leader Impact: Jennifer Baccon, M.D., Ph.D., MHCM

As a pathologist, Jennifer Baccon, M.D., Ph.D., MHCM learned early in her career to appreciate and understand colleagues across the organizations she worked in – clinicians and non-clinicians alike. These experiences translated well into a philosophy of leadership that prioritizes the input of others in decision-making. "Listen first and then speak," she says. "A lot of leaders want to be in charge and tell people what to do. To me that's completely backward . . . Seek first to understand and then to be understood." 

Dr. Baccon is Chair of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine at Akron Children's. She is also the organization's Medical Director of Value Analysis in Supply Chain, which illustrates how she has challenged herself as a physician leader to step outside her clinical comfort zone to expand her career opportunities.