APCs: The Leadership Pipeline Healthcare Is Sitting On

Healthcare has a workforce problem. Physician shortages are widening, primary care slots go unfilled on Match Day, and post-acute care settings struggle to attract providers. Meanwhile, nearly 700,000 advanced practice clinicians (APCs) are embedded across care settings, often deployed as gap-fillers rather than developed as the leaders they could be.

Dan Collard sits down with Don Taylor, president of Don Taylor Leadership, LLC, and adjunct professor at UT Southwestern Medical Center’s School of Public Health, to make the case that the APC workforce is one of healthcare’s most underutilized assets.

Their conversation offers several insights for healthcare leaders thinking about workforce strategy, leadership development, and care redesign:

This isn’t another “perfect storm.” Healthcare is at an inflection point. A storm passes. An inflection point demands a structural response. The current model, which trains APCs for clinical excellence and then either sidelines their leadership potential or promotes them without preparation, is not a staffing problem. It is a design problem. Taylor speaks from experience: As a retired U.S. Air Force colonel, he commanded the busiest trauma hospital in Iraq as the only non-physician to hold that role. APCs were central to that mission, shaping his conviction that the civilian healthcare system has never caught up to what APCs are actually capable of doing and leading.

APCs need a real path into leadership. (the case for vertical development) “The systems dismiss their leadership potential,” Taylor says. “When they’re looked at again, just to fill the gaps, they’re looked at as a way to plug in and fix the problem.” The fix is to build a structured path, set leadership expectations, and develop APCs with the same intentionality as physicians. The goal is a fair path to CNO, COO, VP of operations, and eventually CEO.

The opportunity extends across the care spectrum. (the case for horizontal development) Horizontal development means rethinking where and how APCs practice. Taylor maps three zones: prevention and low-intensity primary care on the left, where APCs are already qualified and AI could expand their opportunities; the intensive care spectrum in the middle, where physicians remain essential; and post-acute care on the right, including skilled nursing, hospice, and palliative care. The horizontal model is about deploying a capable workforce into areas where patients and health systems need more capacity.

APC development should be physician-and, not physician-or. Taylor argues that this model could also support physician well-being. Physicians have been trained to control care across every setting and level of intensity. That expectation is unsustainable. “A path to better well-being for a physician is to embrace this concept and to let go of things they can’t do,” says Taylor.

AI could expand the APC opportunity, but training has to come with it. Taylor has been teaching AI governance for health systems across the country and sees a direct connection between AI augmentation and APC practice expansion. A customized, clinically trusted AI model could allow APCs to practice more independently in primary care settings, flagging cases that require physician involvement. Taylor notes that less than 10 percent of healthcare workers currently using AI have been formally trained on it. Developing APCs as informed, ethical navigators of AI is not a future problem, but a present one.

Put it to work now.

1. Audit how your organization uses APCs. If the answer is primarily staffing gaps, that is the design problem to solve first.
2. Invest in formal leadership development for APCs with the same intentionality you bring to physician or nursing pipelines.
3. Map your care spectrum horizontally and identify where legacy barriers are limiting APC practice.
4. Bring physicians into the APC conversation as partners and teachers.
5. Get ahead of AI governance. Train the people using it and consider what a trusted AI tool could do for your APC workforce specifically.

Don Taylor will bring this conversation to the Rewiring Healthcare: Foundation to Future conference, October 20-21, 2026, in Nashville, TN. Click here to register.

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 About Don Taylor:

Don Taylor is president of Don Taylor Leadership, LLC, and an adjunct professor at UT Southwestern Medical Center’s School of Public Health. He was most recently a professor of practice, healthcare leadership & management and director of the Alliance for Physician Leadership at UT Dallas. Don is a retired U.S. Air Force colonel who has served for over 45 years in various roles in healthcare operations, strategy, and leadership. He has been the CEO of hospitals and served as the COO of academic medical center Wilford Hall USAF Medical Center (6,000+ staff) in San Antonio. He also led the largest trauma hospital in Iraq in 2006 as the only non-physician commander (CEO). He has served as the associate and acting director at various VA medical centers in Illinois, Texas, and Arizona. Recently, he served as the VP of healthcare administration for the HHS mission in Dallas. He also teaches emerging and senior leaders at UT Southwestern on leadership, strategy, health transformation, and value-based care. His speaking and workshop interests are physician well-being, leadership development, organizational culture, AI governance, and strategic alignment of our U.S. healthcare system.