Shayla Higginbotham joins CohnReznick as head of healthcare advisory

Shayla Higginbotham has joined accounting and consulting firm CohnReznick as principal and leader of the healthcare advisory practice. She is based in Raleigh, NC.

Higginbotham brings more than 20 years of management consulting and healthcare industry experience. She has deep expertise developing strategic plans, implementing financial improvements, and delivering operational enhancements for community and academic health systems, ambulatory care networks, and extended care facilities.

In her new role at CohnReznick, Higginbotham will grow and develop the healthcare advisory practice and help providers, payers, and producers redesign go-to-market offerings for sustainable success.

“Owners and operators, including private equity firms, are seeking strategic guidance to help them navigate the constantly evolving healthcare ecosystem,” said Gary Levy, CohnReznick’s chief strategy and growth officer. “As more healthcare organizations turn to CohnReznick for growth-focused advisory services, Shayla’s expertise will complement our team’s deep bench strength in revenue cycle management, transaction advisory, healthcare technology, and restructuring as the firm continues to place strategic priority on delivering high-quality healthcare advisory services.”

Higginbotham joins CohnReznick from FTI Consulting, where she spent over four years and was a managing director focusing on performance transformation. Before that, she was an operations manager at Deloitte for two-and-a-half years.

Prior to entering the consulting industry, Higginbotham held several senior roles in the healthcare industry – including chief operating officer of the Holtz Children’s & Women’s Hospital in Miami. Before that she was a senior healthcare consultant in Duke Medicine’s Middle East division and a senior administrative director in Duke Medicine’s Heart Center in Raleigh-Durham.

Earlier in her career, Higginbotham was a director of operations and projects at Wesley Long Community Hospital in Greensboro.

She has since January 2022 served as an adjunct assistant professor in the University of North Carolina (UNC) Gillings School of Global Public Health.

Higginbotham has a master’s degree in health administration and a bachelor’s degree in health policy and administration from UNC. She is also a certified project management professional.

CohnReznick is the 15th-largest accounting and consulting firm in the United States, according to Inside Public Accounting, with $838.6 million in annual revenue. The New York-headquartered firm has nearly 4,000 people across 25 locations in the US, Cayman Islands, India, and Australia.