Physician as Leader
Move from clinical excellence to leadership effectiveness in three focused days built for the realities of medicine. The program meets the challenges physicians face when the work shifts from patient care toward leading people, teams, and organizations, and it sends you home with frameworks you can use the following Monday.
Program 2: Wednesday - Friday, October 14 - 16, 2026
Program 3: Wednesday - Friday, March 3 - 5, 2027
Berkeley Faculty Club, Berkeley, California
“Outstanding leadership program for physicians at all stages of their leadership career.”
What Past Participants Say
Participant ratings, inaugural February 2026 cohort. 9 of 9 participants responded.
“Three days packed with strategies, emotions, and practical advice. I learned so much and I am going back home resourced and looking forward to putting into practice what I learned.”
Program Features
Communication, trust-building and coaching skills development for medical leaders
Highly experiential, immediately applicable frameworks
Peer learning with other physician leaders
Team of faculty from healthcare and business
Program Objectives
Cultivate self-awareness, emotional intelligence and communication skills for effective physician leadership
Develop coaching skills to maximize healthcare team potential
Deliver compelling stories to inspire action across healthcare departments
“The Physician as Leader conference was unlike any other leadership development/conference I have been to. The way that this group of physicians were able to engage and really do some deep mindset work was inspiring and rejuvenating. This conference came at a time that I needed a reset and I definitely feel like that was achieved.”
Day 1: Leading Self - Building Your Leadership Foundation
Before you can lead others well, you have to lead yourself. Day 1 develops the self-awareness, emotional intelligence, and presence that anchor strong leadership, and the authentic presence that earns a team's trust. Through storytelling work, you'll practice communicating with clarity and compassion. This is the foundation the next two days build on.
Day 2: Leading Others - Mastering Team Development & Engagement
Healthcare leadership rests on your ability to connect with, motivate, and develop your team. Day 2 focuses on the interpersonal work: building trust, holding the difficult conversations most leaders avoid, and giving feedback that actually changes things. You'll practice coaching skills and inclusive leadership that ease burnout and lift engagement, and listening that creates the psychological safety a team needs to do hard work together.
Day 3: Leading the Organization - Delivering Your Vision
Physician leaders have to influence beyond their own team, driving change and rallying people around a shared vision. Day 3 works at the systems level: crafting and telling stories that move people to act, making complex initiatives memorable, and communicating a vision with authenticity. You'll also work on building culture that holds through times of crisis.
Seats are limited and the group is kept small. Register now, or schedule a call to talk through whether the timing works for you.
“Physician as Leader was life changing, beautiful and brings clarity to one’s vision and passion in a way that words cannot express, it can only be felt and experienced!”
Faculty from Healthcare and Business
A team drawn from both medicine and the business-school leadership tradition, so the frameworks are rigorous and the context is yours.
Mark Rittenberg, Ed.D.
Founder
For over thirty years, Dr. Rittenberg has helped organizations build communities of excellence and helped individuals become leaders who move people through the power of communication. He is a Distinguished Teaching Fellow at the UC Berkeley Haas School of Business, where he leads the Leadership Communications program for the Evening/Weekend and Executive MBA programs, and he teaches in executive programs at Kellogg, Case Western, and Washington University in St. Louis. His Active Communicating methodology and five Powers of Authentic Leadership draw on his background as an actor and director and his cross-cultural work across the US, Africa, Asia, and the Middle East. He holds a doctorate in International and Multicultural Education.
Christopher Newton, MD, FACS, FAAP
Faculty
Dr. Newton is a professor of surgery at UCSF and chair of pediatric surgery at UCSF Benioff Children's Hospital Oakland. He built Oakland's Level 1 pediatric trauma program and has held pediatric-trauma leadership roles at the local, state, and national level. In 2019 he received one of two federal ASPR grants to establish a regional pediatric disaster center of excellence (WRAPEM), and he is one of four national co-principal investigators for the HRSA-funded Pediatric Pandemic Network. He brings a working surgeon-leader's perspective to the room.
Daniel Sugai, MD, FAAD
Faculty
Dr. Sugai is a board-certified dermatologist and one of the most widely followed physician communicators in the country, known online as Dr. SPF. A Hawaii-born, Harvard-trained dermatologist, he has built an audience of more than a million by translating complex medicine into clear, evidence-based content and countering online misinformation. As founder of Sugai Academy, he teaches clinicians to use communication and storytelling to build trust and extend their influence. At Physician as Leader he leads a session on Storytelling and Influence in Modern Medicine.
Aaron Tabacco, PhD
Faculty & Executive Coach
Aaron Tabacco has led people through growth and change in demanding settings for over thirty years. He is Director of Staff Experience at the UCSF Department of Medicine, where he runs an internal executive-coaching program for physician leaders, physician-scientists, and senior administrators across academic medicine. A former professor of nursing and a published scholar in the neurobiology of learning, he is known for compassionate coaching, transformational feedback, and mediation in high-stakes environments from C-suites to ICUs. He is a BECI-certified executive coach and a frequent AAMC speaker on leadership development.
Susan Houlihan, MBA
COO, Faculty & Executive Coach
Susan Houlihan is a communications consultant, executive coach, and electrical engineer whose 15+ years in Silicon Valley engineering and operations ground her coaching in real business practice. She lectures in leadership, coaching, and communications in the UC Berkeley Haas EWMBA/EMBA programs and teaches across several UC Berkeley executive and engineering-leadership programs. A PCC-credentialed coach through the ICF and a certified executive coach through BECI, where she leads strategic operations, she has worked with individuals and Fortune 500 companies across the Americas, Europe, and Asia, including UCSF Benioff Children's Hospital Oakland, Genentech, and Novartis.
Jennifer Caleshu, MBA
VP Marketing & Operations, Faculty & Executive Coach
Jennifer Caleshu is a lecturer, facilitator, and certified executive coach in leadership, communications, design thinking, and innovation. She teaches in the UC Berkeley Haas MBA programs as a Continuing Lecturer in courses including Building Trust-Based Relationships and Leadership Communications, and has facilitated leadership programs including High-Impact Leadership and Berkeley Physician Leaders. She is a faculty member and executive coach with BECI, where she serves as Faculty Director for the coaching certification programs and Vice President of Marketing and Operations. She holds an MBA with honors from Haas and a BA in Human Biology from Stanford, and is a PCC-credentialed coach.
Benjamin Mertz
Faculty & Executive Coach
Benjamin Mertz is a facilitator, executive coach, and educator whose work centers on trust, storytelling, and open-hearted dialogue. He has coached leaders one-on-one at organizations including Google, Cisco, Applied Materials, and Fairmont Hotels, and brings more than fifteen years of experience helping teams strengthen cross-cultural communication, break down silos, and build environments where people do their best work. A certified executive coach through BECI, his approach rests on curiosity, creativity, and a belief in the capability of the people he works with.
Allan Fair
Consultant for Corporate Engagement, Facilitator & Executive Coach
Allan Fair is a facilitator, executive coach, and accountability partner who spent twenty years as an agency creative for many of the world's biggest brands across healthcare, finance, media, and consumer goods. That background gives him a wide view of leadership challenges across industries. Now an executive coach and creative consultant, he helps individuals and teams align passion and purpose, reframe limiting beliefs, and bring their ideas to life. He is a certified executive coach through BECI and an active member of its facilitator roster.