Child and adolescent psychiatry. Exploring the option to be a manager in an academic medical center.

Traditionally, few child psychiatrists have opted for careers as senior managers in academic medical centers, preferring to emphasize their clinical role and hoping their clinical work will be valued and reimbursed despite economic pressures. Yet the career of a hospital-wide manager in an academic medical center provides opportunities to promote an individual's career, the mission of the whole organization, and child psychiatry itself. Drawing on some of the issues discussed in the general literature on the clinician-executive, this article outlines the basic qualities and skills required to be a successful child psychiatrist executive and delineates the essential steps and potential pitfalls in building such a career. This delineation looks at the developmental stage of both the psychiatrist and the organization involved. The authors emphasize the importance of child psychiatrists assuming active roles within academic medical centers to protect and enhance the field of child psychiatry.