By Lacie Blankenship
The 3-week Accelerator® Summer Business Immersion certificate program at Vanderbilt Owen Graduate School of Management allows college students and recent graduates to get real-world consulting experience through client projects. HCA Healthcare was one of the 3 clients for the summer 2024 cohort; read below for information on HCA Healthcare, the project the students were tasked with, and the solutions the students prepared.
The Client: HCA Healthcare
Accelerator students spend 3 weeks learning from Vanderbilt Business faculty.
HCA Healthcare, one of the nation’s leading providers of healthcare services, was the Week 2 client for the summer 2024 Accelerator students. HCA Healthcare consists of 188 hospitals and approximately 2,400 sites of care, including surgery centers, freestanding emergency rooms, urgent care clinics, home health and hospice agencies, and physician clinics, located in 20 states and the United Kingdom. The organization is headquartered only a mile from Management Hall, where Accelerator students gathered to work on the HCA Healthcare project and pitched their resolutions to leaders within the organization.
The HCA Healthcare Project
Students were tasked with exploring and presenting novel growth strategies and opportunities for HCA Healthcare to increase earnings. They were provided information on the organization’s current assets and a map of its major markets; they were also given select financial and general boundaries and limitations.
Accelerator Student Presentations
The student teams had 10 minutes to present and pitch their ideas to leaders from HCA Healthcare. A slide deck accompanied each presentation to help attendees visualize the pitches, including financial models and cited resources. The students pitched various well-thought-out ideas and developed ideas for the organization to branch into new growth areas. After each team concluded their presentation, the team from HCA Healthcare had the opportunity to ask detailed questions and seek clarification on any components of their pitch.
“As someone who grew up in Nashville, it was amazing to have the opportunity to work with HCA through Accelerator,” says Anson Anderson, 2024 Accelerator participant and undergraduate student at Hamilton College. “HCA’s feedback and the project itself both gave me a high level of confidence in my consulting skills.”
The Winning Team
The winning team for Week 2 gathered for a celebratory photo in the lobby of Management Hall.
The HCA Healthcare team awarded first place to Team B, Anson Anderson, Ty Cosse, Peyton Hudson, Aidan McCormack, Patrick Treacy, and Nick Tan. Team B was coached by Matthew Gordon (MBA’24) and Jeffrey Kohl (MBA’24). The team developed and presented a proposal for HCA Healthcare that pulled on the heartstrings of everyone watching the presentations.
Feedback from HCA Healthcare
Before announcing the winning team for the project, the representatives from HCA Healthcare shared their notes on what they were impressed with and graciously gave suggestions for ways students could improve for future clients. They noted specific ways teams impressed them; for example, they credited the winning team, Team B, with establishing an unmatched connection through storytelling and another team for implementing humor into their presentation.
“I enjoyed the HCA Healthcare project because it provided me with real-world consulting experience while focusing on an issue I’m passionate about,” says Peyton Hudson, 2024 Accelerator participant and undergraduate student at Vanderbilt University.
