Steve Hobson
Staff pharmacist
When I started my pharmacy career it was in a community pharmacy, I quickly
discovered that my upward mobility would be limited over time. There were
no real advancement opportunities beyond staff pharmacist. If I was to
move ahead, I'd need to own my own store. Learning the business
end of a retail operation became my early career goal.
Pharmacy manager
My next position was as a pharmacy manager in a retail pharmacy that held
the potential of my taking over the business someday. I became heavily
involved in the business side of this operation and learned a great deal
about running a pharmacy. Unfortunately, the opportunity to move into
an ownership role never materialized and after a couple of years I decided
to move on.
Staff pharmacist
Over the next several years, I worked in a number of community pharmacies
that were increasingly larger in size and volume. While these positions
offered me excellent broad exposure to running a pharmacy, the opportunity
to own or buy my own business remained limited. During that time I married,
and my short-term goals shifted to wanting a more stable environment with
predictable hours and good benefits. That was when a friend told me about
Medco Health. I joined the company as a staff pharmacist and after just
one year my career started to take off.
Pharmacy manager
I was one of the first pharmacists responsible for managed care interventions.
It was a brand new function at Medco and I was identified as someone with
the skill set to perform well in this position. From there, I moved into
Health Care Operations and managed a pharmacy support group, after which
my responsibilities expanded to include the direct management of a group
of pharmacists. After two years of excellent experience, I moved my career
forward to Director of Pharmacy Practice.
Director of Pharmacy Practice
In this position, I assumed tremendous responsibility for all pharmacist
activity in one of our largest call center pharmacies. This position required
having full responsibility for all the regulatory, compliance, Board of
Pharmacy, DEA interaction and any other pharmacist related activity –
all coming under the umbrella of my license. After two years, I was promoted
to Vice President of Operations.
Vice President, Operations
The call center pharmacy was growing rapidly and it really expanded my
career potential. By moving from the clinical management perspective to
business management, I had the chance to become involved in all aspects
of the business side of running a pharmacy, from budgeting to business
plans, but with a far greater scope than I had ever before experienced
in a retail environment.
VP/General Manager
VP/GM is the second most senior position offered in the managed care setting
for pharmacists. This position was the natural culmination of the two
positions I previously held, VP of Operations and Director of Pharmacy
Practice. Now, both of these positions reported to me as I oversaw the
success of this critical call center pharmacy.
Regional VP, Pharmacy Operations
All of the regional VP/GMs report to me now. It is my responsibility to
ensure that these pharmacies, handling a combined 1.6 million prescriptions
per week are well staffed with talented pharmacists, operating at peak
efficiency and quality levels, and are poised for the continued growth
projected in the managed care practice setting. As I tell new pharmacy
students I meet on campus during recruiting events, at Medco Health you
can write your own ticket. It's all up to you!
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