John Pakutka directs The Crescent Group, an advisory services firm with expertise in healthcare management, policy and litigation. Firm clients have included Fortune 500 companies, Global 100 law firms, health systems, investment banks, state governments and the United States Department of Justice. Over its 17-year history, The Crescent Group has assisted health systems in a wide range of performance improvement, business development and innovation initiatives. This work has contributed to well-documented increases in health system profitability and market share. Specific areas of engagement include distressed hospital turn-arounds, performance management program development, a new hospital launch, oncology model redesign, primary care/behavioral health integration, patient centered medical home adoption, federal advocacy program development, accountable care organization development and physician practice acquisition and onboarding.

Currently, John advises The Health Employer Exchange (HEE), which aims to build member population health management capabilities. The HEE is comprised of Cleveland Clinic, Baylor Scott & White, UCLA, Yale New Haven, and UVA Health Systems, and a range of private sector partners. John works as well with a Virginia Health Quality Center-led collaboration of healthcare providers (Virginia Commonwealth University and Bon Secours Health System) and social service agencies (public and non-profit) committed to building an Accountable Health Community.

John has served on numerous public and non-profit boards and commissions. Currently, he serves on the Commonwealth of Virginia’s Excellence in Mental Health Act Steering Committee and a council of the South Central Connecticut Regional Mental Health Board. He previously served on the Connecticut State Legislature’s Task Force on Small Business Health Costs.

Prior to founding The Crescent Group in 1998, John completed employment stints at Exxon/Reliance Electric, the United States Government Accountability Office (GAO), Yale University, and APM/Computer Sciences Corporation. At APM, John staffed or managed reengineering projects at North Shore LIJ, Barnes Jewish Children’s and Atlantic Health Systems. Scope included patient care delivery redesign, clinical effectiveness program development, performance management system design, and technology transfer program implementation.

John holds a B.S. in Electrical Engineering from Cornell and a Masters in Public and Private Management from Yale, where he lectures annually in the Product Planning class at the School of Management. In 2014, at the Yale Law School, John co-led the Innovations in Health and Healthcare student reading group. He is co-author with Yale Professors Ted Marmor and Jerry Mashaw of Social Insurance: America’s Neglected Heritage and Contested Future (Sage/Congressional Quarterly, 2013, book summary at sixthreats.com).