Every challenge.
One call.
EverFern.
In crisis?
Revenue slipping. Good people leaving. A survey coming. You need someone who walks in, takes charge, and stays until it's fixed.
At a crossroads?
A payer change, an acquisition, a new management company. You need someone who has made that move before and knows what's on the other side.
Owners don't search for advisors. They call someone they trust and ask one question: can you help us get this right? Every challenge. One call.
Our founder is a former practice CEO and COO who has worked with healthcare organizations at every stage, from the brink of collapse to the edge of a major decision. We work on finances, operations, process, culture and compliance at the same time, from the inside, not the sidelines. Not every engagement starts with a crisis. Some start with a question, a transition, or a decision that needs the right experience to get right.
Where we make the biggest difference.
Financial turnaround
We audit revenue, billing, collections and scheduling to find what's being left on the table, then cut costs with precision, without cutting care.
Operational transformation
We find the bottlenecks, duplicate work and automation opportunities across every department, then rebuild workflows until the practice runs well.
Process improvement
We map every workflow end to end, remove what's broken or redundant, and build standard processes that lower risk and make the practice easier to run.
Culture revival
We listen first, to owners, leaders and every level of staff, then build the channels that help people feel heard, valued and invested in the outcome.
Regulatory compliance
We review inspection history, close compliance gaps and build a full system for the next survey, because without your license nothing else matters.
Leaders and teams
We coach and mentor the people who run your practice, with clear roles, training and accountability, so the gains last after we step back.
Four ways in.
Turnaround consulting
A full rescue for practices on the brink. We embed, take charge, and stay until the crisis is resolved and the foundation is solid.
Operational strategy
For owners facing a major decision: a market shift, a structural change, a payer transition, an acquisition. Experienced operational and financial analysis before you move.
Process improvement
End-to-end assessment and redesign across clinical, front office and business functions. Less waste, less risk, and systems that scale.
Leadership development
Coaching, mentoring and management training for physician owners, administrators and managers, grounded in a PhD in Leadership Studies.
Fast. Serious.
Genuinely human.
Buffy Howard holds a PhD in Leadership Studies and an MBA, but her real education happened in the field: inside struggling organizations, fractured teams and regulatory crises, where the stakes were people's jobs and patients' care. She has also been on the other side of the table. As the owner and operator of a licensed adult family home in Washington State, she knows what it feels like to sign the checks, manage the staff, and be accountable for everything.
She has been described as fast, serious, down to earth and fun. She brings an energy into a room that makes people believe things can actually get better, and then she proves it. She is not a report writer or a slideshow consultant. She walks in, takes charge, and stays until the job is done.
Based in Tacoma, Washington, she works with a small number of organizations at a time and goes all in on each one, because when employees thrive, every other metric follows.
Her first job out of college was at a nursing home in the middle of a regulatory crisis. They called it the War Room: sticky notes covering every wall, citations everywhere, everyone scrambling. Buffy walked in, looked around, and knew this was the work she was meant to do.
She earned her administrator license, took over her first facility, poorly run, losing money, with unhappy staff, and turned it around. Then she did it again, and again. For fifteen years she was the person moved from facility to facility once the work was done.
The pattern followed her. As a Regional Vice President at a national urgent care and workers' compensation company, she turned around a failing multi-state region and beat earnings targets by $14 million in one year. At a five-clinic radiation oncology practice, she built the HR, compliance and operational backbone it had never had, while improving culture, patient experience and financial results. As CEO of a multi-site ophthalmology practice, she rebuilt operations from the ground up: new practice management software, payroll, IT and financial controls. Along the way she led value-based care work in alternative payment models, Medicare strategy and payer relationships.
She didn't go looking for broken things. Broken things found her. And she has never left one the way she found it.
Twenty-five years. Real results.
Results achieved in prior executive roles. Organizations not named.
The background behind the advice.
PhD, Leadership Studies
Saint Martin's University, Lacey, WA. Dissertation: Leadership, Equity, and Organizational Culture.
Master of Business Administration
University of Phoenix, Seattle, WA.
Adjunct Faculty, Saint Martin's University
Teaches Health Care Policy and Regulation in the MBA program. School of Business Advisory Board, 2025 to present.
Speaker and trainer
Leadership training, management development and keynote presentations.
Governor-appointed Chapter Governor
Washington Health Care Association.
Baldrige Bronze National Quality Award
American Health Care Association, 2011.
One call changes everything.
Tell us what's happening. You'll talk with Buffy directly.