Trevor Fetter

Trevor Fetter is a Senior Lecturer on the faculty of Harvard Business School. He teaches two MBA required courses: Leadership and Corporate Accountability, and Financial Reporting and Control and a Short Intensive Program for MBA students called The Life and Role of the CEO. 

After graduating from HBS in 1986, Trevor worked in investment banking for two years before joining a client, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, ultimately becoming Chief Financial Officer. In 1995 he joined former client Tenet Healthcare Corporation.  Trevor was Tenet’s Chief Financial Officer through the end of 1999, when he became the founding Chairman and CEO of Broadlane, a Tenet spin-off that was a leader in improving the performance of healthcare providers in the supply chain using emerging e-commerce technology. Broadlane was named one of Inc. magazine's 500 fastest growing private companies. Trevor served as Broadlane’s Chairman and CEO from 2000 through 2002, and Chairman until the company was sold several years later.

Trevor returned to Tenet in late 2002 and was named Chief Executive Officer in 2003.  Under his leadership, the company grew to $20 billion in revenues (Fortune ~#130) and steadily increased EBITDA and margins. With 130,000 people, Tenet was one of the ~50 largest employers in the U.S. and had operations in more than 40 states and the United Kingdom. After early initiatives that dramatically improved the clinical quality of Tenet’s hospitals, Trevor launched a strategy to diversify the company’s portfolio into faster-growing areas of healthcare while strengthening the core hospital business. Between an active program of acquisitions and divestitures, Tenet increased the portion its hospitals that were #1 or #2 in their markets from less than half to more than three-quarters.  Most importantly, he took the company in a new direction, launching adjacent businesses in revenue cycle management and ambulatory surgery. Those businesses, which operate as Conifer Health Solutions and United Surgical Partners International, are now multi-billion-dollar enterprises and #1 in their respective fields. Trevor retired as Chairman and CEO of Tenet in late 2017.

Drawing on his executive experience, in addition to teaching, Trevor is an active corporate director and investor. He currently serves as lead independent director of The Hartford Financial Services Group, a diversified Fortune 150 financial services company principally engaged in insurance. He also serves on the boards of and is an investor in private healthcare services and healthcare technology companies Omada Health, Biofourmis, Trimedx Inc., and Regent Surgical Health. He is also a director of the Santa Catalina Island Company. He also serves on the Advisory Boards of two multi-national leaders in their fields: TowerBrook Capital Partners, a private equity firm, and Access Healthcare, a healthcare technology services firm. He is also an advisor to, and investor in, several early-stage companies seeking to transform important elements of the healthcare system. Trevor’s non-profit activities include the boards of the Catalina Island Conservancy, the Board of Fellows of Stanford Medicine, and the Smithsonian National Board.  At Harvard Business School, he has served on the board of dean’s advisors and the healthcare initiative advisory board.

Trevor received a bachelor’s degree in economics from Stanford University in 1982 and an MBA from Harvard Business School in 1986.  He is married to his Stanford classmate, Melissa Fetter, a community volunteer and proprietor of Beacon Hill Books and Café in Boston. Together they were honored with the 2017 Henry Cohn Humanitarian Award presented by the Anti-Defamation League.

Cases and Teaching Materials

• Fubini, David G., Rebecca Henderson, Sarah Gulick, and Trevor Fetter. "Crisis at the 11th Hour." Harvard Business School Case 320-041, January 2020. (Revised November 2020.) View Details
• Nelson, J.S., and Trevor Fetter. "Fiduciary Duties Law for Managers: An Overview." Harvard Business School Background Note 322-073, November 2021. View Details
• Nelson, J.S., and Trevor Fetter. "Legal Analysis: Sexual Misconduct in the Workplace ." Harvard Business School Technical Note 322-085, January 2022. (Revised January 2023.) View Details
• Fetter, Trevor. "TXU (A) and (B): Powering the Largest Leveraged Buyout in History." Harvard Business School Teaching Note 122-008, January 2022. View Details
• Fetter, Trevor, and Kira Seiger. "Roll-Ups and Surprise Billing: Collisions at the Intersection of Private Equity and Patient Care." Harvard Business School Case 321-049, November 2020. (Revised April 2021.) View Details
• Snowberg, Erik, Trevor Fetter, and Amy W. Schulman. "The Business of Pain: Johnson & Johnson and the Promise of Opioids (B)." Harvard Business School Supplement 720-423, December 2019. View Details
• Fetter, Trevor, Eugene F. Soltes, and Grant Wahlquist. "Background on Insider Trading Liability." Harvard Business School Background Note 320-080, December 2019. (Revised January 2020.) View Details
• Snowberg, Erik, Trevor Fetter, and Amy W. Schulman. "The Business of Pain: Johnson & Johnson and the Promise of Opioids." Harvard Business School Case 720-420, December 2019. View Details
• Fetter, Trevor, Erik Snowberg, and Rebecca M. Henderson. "The Leveraged Buyout of TXU: (B) Energy Future Holdings." Harvard Business School Supplement 320-065, December 2019. (Revised January 2021.) View Details
• Fetter, Trevor, Erik Snowberg, and Rebecca M. Henderson. "TXU (A): Powering the Largest Leveraged Buyout in History." Harvard Business School Case 320-064, December 2019. (Revised December 2022.) View Details
• Toffel, Michael W., Trevor Fetter, John Masko, and Sarah Mehta. "JUUL and the Vaping Revolution." Harvard Business School Teaching Note 619-068, May 2019. View Details

Areas of Interest

• corporate governance
• entrepreneurship
• healthcare management
• leadership
• strategy
Additional Topics
• boards of directors
• corporate culture
• ethics