UF isn’t just a great place to receive an education: It’s also a great place to work.
Forbes’ first-ever ranking of “America’s Best Employers” shows UF as ninth among public universities to work for and No. 121 overall. It also ranked UF Health No. 25 among health care providers.
Forbes partnered with Statista.com to survey 20,000 American workers to compile a list of the top 500 companies.
“Just to be on that list is amazing,” said Dr. David Guzick, the president of UF Health. “There are thousands of health systems out there.”
Guzick said UF Health ranking No. 25 represents the cumulative efforts that everyone has made over the years.
“I think due to the effort of a lot of people, we have become more powerful as a functionally integrated academic health center,” he said.
UF can distinguish itself among university health care providers, Guzick said.
“The University of Florida and its health system is one of three universities in the country where there are six health sciences colleges on the same campus as the parent university, which also is the home to the university-affiliated hospital,” Guzick said.
The other two are Ohio State University and the University of Minnesota.
He has been with UF Health for six years and said he is looking forward to the next six.
Another element that makes UF Health unique from other health care providers is that the hospital, medical schools and other health colleges are under common leadership and guidance.
“As a result of that, the hospital can invest not only in itself but in its faculty,” Guzick said.
Professor Richard Lutz said he came to UF because of its good marketing department. He also said he liked the idea of starting a family in a college town.
There were times he could have found a better job, but not better colleagues, Lutz said.
“What has kept me here is the quality of my colleagues,” he said.
[A version of this story ran on page 4 on 4/14/2015]
