Jeffrey Levin-Scherz

Jeff Levin-Scherz is a managing director and the co-leader of North American Health Management Practice at Willis Towers Watson, where he helps large employers develop, implement and evaluate their health management strategy, including care management programs, incentive programs, and technology programs. Jeff’s clients include financial services organizations, telecommunication firms, defense and aerospace contractors, media companies, health care providers, and hospitality companies. Jeff leads intellectual capital development for Willis Towers Watson in the Health Management space. He is a member of the firm’s global Communicable Disease Response Team.

Jeff has written and spoken widely on health care policy, especially around the adoption of disruptive innovation, and the use of behavioral economics to drive performance in the health care delivery system and behavior among employees and in the general population. He led work on a World Economic Forum project on Human Centric Health presented in Davos, Switzerland in 2017. His work has been published in JAMA, the Journal of General Internal Medicine, and the Harvard Business Review.

Jeff has a broad range of experience in health care delivery and finance. He served as a physician executive leader of provider organizations including a large independent practice association, an integrated delivery network, a multispecialty group practice, and a venture-funded technology enabled national primary care practice. He also served for seven years as a vice president of a top-ranked regional health plan. Jeff has been a participant in technical expert panels convened by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, the Institute of Medicine and the Urban Institute.

Jeff is an Assistant Professor at the Harvard TH Chan School of Public Health, where he teaches courses on provider payment and managing health care costs. He has given guest lectures frequently, including at Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health and The Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania.

Jeff has an MD from the Boston University School of Medicine, and received his MBA from Columbia Business School.

Selected Presentations

• Call to Action: Employers should demand higher quality maternity care, and Innovative Approaches to Maternity Care National Business Group on Health, Washington, DC January, 2020
• New Approaches to Low Wage Workers, Catalyze Payment Reform Webinar, September, 2017
• Managing Health Care Costs - 2018 final class slides HPM 235 Harvard TH Chan School of Public Health
• Driving Consumers to High Value Providers, Connecticut Institute forJoint Replacement, Connecticut Health Council, and Connecticut Business Group on Health. West Hartford, CT, December 2017
• The Future of Health Care Reform and Managing Health Care Costs, February, Wharton, 2017
• Behavioral Economics Can Improve Health World Economic Forum, Davos Switzerland, 2017
• 2016 Haddad Lecture: Employer sponsored health insurance and low wage workers Massachusetts General Hospital, 2016
• Rock Health Boot Camp Boston, 2013
• Employer Efforts to Curtail Costs, and Implications for Providers June, 2011
• Accountable Care Organizations March, 2011
• Managing Health Care Costs: 2010 Final Class Slides, December, 2010
• Employers and Health Care Management in the United States, September, 2010
• Implications of Health Care Reform, HFMA October, 2010
• Patients, Physicians and the Internet, Center For IT Leadership, Boston May, 2009
• Quality and Cost and Variation, Wharton, February, 09
• Provider Perspective on Pay for Performance (Presentation to UK NHS, February, 2009)
• Behavioral Economics and Health Policy (Harvard School of Public Health, November, 2008)
• The Role of Payment Reform in a Multi-Year Health Care Transformation in Massachusetts, April 2008, Washington DC Health Industry Forum
• Innovation in Health Care: Provider Perspective (UK NHS, 4/08)
• Controversies in Transparency and Pay for Performance (Singapore, October, 2007)
• New Paradigm for Public Quality Reporting (Singapore, October, 2007)
• Five Problems, and Leadership to Address Them (Harvard Business School Publications, June, 2006
• Communicating Health Care Quality To Consumers, March 2004 Managed Care Executive Group, Florida
• Physician Compensation and the 2002 Nobel Prize in Economics (2003, Web conference)
• Cooking the Books: Evaluation of Disease Management Programs, San Francisco, 2003

2020 Publications (COVID-focused)

• Levin-Scherz, J and Stone, J "Charting a New Course: Implications of the Pandemic for Health Plan Sponsors" Benefits Magazine, November 2021 Link
• Levin-Scherz, J and Allen, D "8 Questions Employers Should Ask About Coronavirus" Harvard Business Review digital publication March 2, 2020 https://hbr.org/2020/03/8-questions-employers-should-ask-about-coronavirus
• Levin-Scherz, J "Federal action can limit impact of COVID-19 costs on American businesses and workers" The Hill, April 13, 2020 https://thehill.com/opinion/healthcare/492551-federal-action-can-limit-impact-of-covid-19-costs-on-american-businesses
• McCann, R and Levin-Scherz, J “Employers can address the racial disparities exposed by COVID-19” Willis Towers Watson, April, 2020
• https://www.willistowerswatson.com/en-US/Insights/2020/04/employers-can-address-the-racial-disparities-exposed-by-covid-19
• Bremen, J, Jesuthasan, R, Levin-Scherz, J "Five Ways COVID-19 Will Forever Change Work" World at Work, May 15, 2020 https://worldatwork.org/workspan/articles/five-ways-covid-19-will-forever-change-work
• Levin-Scherz, J and Allen, D "8 Questions Employers Should Ask About Reopening" Harvard Business Review digital publication May 28, 2020 https://hbr.org/2020/05/8-questions-employers-should-ask-about-reopening
• Levin-Scherz, J, Noblick, J and Jones, JH, "How behavioral economics can help employers respond to COVID-19" Human Resources Executive, May, 2020 https://hrexecutive.com/how-behavioral-economics-can-help-employers-respond-to-covid-19/
• Levin-Scherz, J, Jesuthasan, R, Bremen, J “Should CEOs be in the Office Now?” Chief Executive Magazine, June 18, 2020 https://chiefexecutive.net/should-ceos-be-in-the-office-now/
• Levin-Scherz, J and Parson, T "The Paradox of Medical Costs During the Pandemic" Econofact.org, June 30, 2020 https://econofact.org/the-paradox-of-medical-costs-during-the-pandemic
• Levin-Scherz, J "The federal government must pay for distribution of the COVID vaccine" The Hill, July 20, 2020 https://thehill.com/opinion/healthcare/508118-the-federal-government-must-pay-for-distribution-of-the-covid-vaccine