CMS Leadership

Stephanie (Steph) Carlton

Acting Administrator

Stephanie Carlton, CMS Chief of Staff and Acting Administrator, is a healthcare leader with unique experience across the dimensions of the U.S. health care economy - business, policy, higher education, and clinical. When a Partner at McKinsey & Company, Stephanie was a leader in McKinsey's SHaPE Practice with a deep focus on innovation and strategy. She also co-founded a place-based transformation with 20 community leaders in Texas to improve holistic health outcomes. Prior to McKinsey, she led Medicare Advantage and Medicaid issues on the US Senate Finance Committee (Republican staff) and worked as a labor & delivery nurse at Georgetown University Hospital.  Stephanie has guest lectured at the University of Pennsylvania Wharton School, served as a fall 2022 resident fellow at the Harvard Kennedy School Institute of Politics, and was on the business school faculty at the University of Texas at Austin. She has served on the boards of the Health Care Cost Institute, Ignite Health Foundation, and the University of Texas McCombs Alumni Association.

Administration