R. Milton Johnson: HCA Chairman & Chief Executive Officer

R. Milton Johnson is a native of Nashville, Tennessee. He holds a bachelor’s degree in business administration from Belmont University. He worked as an accountant with what is now Ernst & Young and spent a couple of years working with HCA accountants. So when he joined HCA in 1982 he had been walking the halls of their headquarters since 1980. So he had actually been involved with HCA right after graduating from college. 

During the period HCA had a large international presence, Milton worked with executives responsible for managing hospitals in the Philippines, Singapore, Australia, and Saudi Arabia. He developed relationships with many of those men and women over time. R. Milton even helped them with their personal tax returns. When HCA offered him a position in the tax department, it wasn’t as if he was joining an unfamiliar company in fact is was quite the opposite. 

In 1987 he was head of HealthTrust tax department when HCA spun off the company. He came back to HCA as vice president of tax when HealthTrust was taken back in by HCA. 

R. Milton climbed the corporate ladder becoming senior vice president and controller, then executive vice president and chief financial offer. In 2009, he was appointed to the board of directors of HCA.  In 2011, he was named president of HCA. In January 2014 ,he began serving as the company’s CEO and on December 2014, he also became chairman. 

R. Milton leads a huge organization, a close to $36 billion integrated healthcare system that includes around 166 hospitals, 113 freestanding surgery centers, and more than 35,000 affiliated physicians  in 20 states and the United Kingdom. The company has its in payroll 220,000 employees of which around 35 percent are registered nurses. 

Milton is a committed volunteer and has held offices in a number of organizations within the community. He is currently a co-chair of Partnership 2020 with the Nashville Chamber of Commerce and serves on the boards of Nashville Health Care Council and the United Way of Metro Nashville, among others.