Chief Clinical Officer

Zufall Health Center•Dover, NJ

12d

About The Position

Reporting to the President and Chief Executive Officer, the Chief Clinical Officer (CCO) is the senior executive responsible for the strategic direction, integration, quality, safety, and effectiveness of clinical care across Zufall Health. The CCO provides enterprise leadership across Medical, Nursing and Clinical Support Services, Dental, Behavioral Health, and Clinical Pharmacy. The role establishes organization-wide clinical standards, priorities, and accountability while empowering service-line leaders to manage day-to-day clinical practice, workforce, and performance. In partnership with the Chief Operating Officer, the CCO aligns clinical capacity, provider deployment, patient access, staffing, and operational infrastructure across sites. The CCO also partners with Quality leadership to evaluate outcomes, identify improvement opportunities, and respond to quality and patient-safety findings. As a member of the executive leadership team, the CCO advises the CEO and Board on clinical strategy, risks, workforce needs, service development, and the quality and sustainability of patient care. The position includes an active clinical practice, described in the posting as approximately 20% of the position and generally equivalent to eight (16) hours per pay period; a later section describes this practice as approximately 10% of the position and approximately eight hours per pay period. The CCO leads senior clinical executives and leaders; oversees clinical policies, standards, credentialing and privileging processes, peer review, and professional-practice expectations; and promotes integrated, accessible, evidence-based, patient-centered care. The position works closely with organizational partners in Operations, Quality, Compliance, Safety, Risk Management, People Operations, and Finance, and represents Zufall in clinical matters with external partners and stakeholders. Other related duties may be assigned by the Chief Executive Officer.

Requirements

MD or DO degree from an accredited medical school, with board certification in a primary care specialty appropriate to Zufall’s clinical services.
Successful completion of an accredited residency program appropriate to the services provided by Zufall Health.
Current unrestricted license, or eligibility for licensure, to practice medicine in New Jersey.
Valid DEA and CDS registration, as applicable.
Current BLS certifications.
Significant progressive experience in ambulatory healthcare, including substantial clinical practice and senior leadership responsibility for clinical services, clinical quality, provider performance, and multidisciplinary teams.
Demonstrated experience leading through other clinical leaders in a complex, multi-site healthcare environment.
Knowledge of Federally Qualified Health Centers, community health, safety-net care, and applicable federal healthcare programs.
Working knowledge of healthcare finance, reimbursement, budgeting, productivity, resource allocation, and strategic planning.
Knowledge of federal and New Jersey regulatory, licensure, accreditation, reimbursement, and certification requirements affecting clinical care and FQHC operations.
Executive leadership grounded in collaboration, accountability, and development of other clinical leaders.
Ability to maintain visibility and credibility in clinical settings through executive rounding, frontline engagement, and direct clinical practice.
Executive judgment and ability to lead in complex, ambiguous, multi-site, and matrixed environments.
Exceptional interpersonal, communication, negotiation, and consensus-building skills, including effective communication with frontline staff, senior leaders, the CEO, and the Board.
Ability to build multidisciplinary teams and partnerships across clinical, operational, workforce, financial, quality, and administrative functions.
Ability to lead organizational change and translate clinical strategy and performance data into sustainable improvement.
Ability to understand and value the contributions of Medical, Nursing and Clinical Support Services, Dental, Behavioral Health, Clinical Pharmacy, Operations, and People Operations to patient care.
Ability to establish credibility and confidence with physicians and other clinical professionals while leading across multiple disciplines.
Awareness of and sensitivity to the communities and patient populations served by Zufall Health.
Commitment to Zufall Health’s mission and values.
Ability and willingness to work as needed to meet executive and clinical responsibilities.
Proficiency with electronic health records, clinical information systems, and standard business technology.

Nice To Haves

Master’s degree in Public Health, Health Care Administration, Business Administration, or a related field.
Experience in a Federally Qualified Health Center, community health center, safety-net healthcare organization, or comparable ambulatory healthcare environment.
Bilingual English/Spanish skills.

Responsibilities

Develop and implement Zufall’s enterprise clinical strategy, establishing clinical priorities, standards, and expectations across disciplines, services, sites, and service lines.
Provide executive leadership and oversight to senior leaders responsible for Medical Services, Dental Services, Behavioral Health, Nursing and Clinical Support Services, and Clinical Pharmacy; hold them accountable for clinical practice, workforce, performance, access, and outcomes.
Oversee clinical credentialing and privileging standards and processes in partnership with clinical leaders, People Operations, and administrative resources.
Promote collaboration and integration among clinical disciplines and external clinical partners to strengthen care coordination, continuity, and whole-person care.
Maintain an active clinical practice consistent with professional licensure, credentials, privileges, organizational policies, and standards of practice.
Support senior clinical leaders in addressing significant provider performance, professional conduct, competency, and clinical-practice concerns that require executive involvement.
Lead, coach, and develop senior clinical leaders; partner on clinical workforce planning, recruitment, retention, succession planning, provider performance, and leadership development.
Partner with the COO and senior clinical leaders to align clinical capacity, provider deployment, staffing, coverage, and scheduling with patient demand and available resources.
Hold senior clinical leaders accountable for the quality, safety, effectiveness, accessibility, productivity, and consistency of care in their service lines.
Partner with Quality leadership to review clinical performance data, identify trends and risks, set improvement priorities, and ensure appropriate clinical responses to performance concerns.
Provide executive oversight of clinical peer review and ensure systems exist within each discipline to evaluate professional practice and clinical performance.
Promote continuous improvement, evidence-based practice, transparency, accountability, and patient safety; provide executive clinical leadership in reviewing significant adverse clinical events while preserving appropriate independence of investigations and risk-management functions.
Collaborate with Quality, Compliance, Safety, Risk Management, People Operations, and Operations to support compliance with applicable regulations, accreditation standards, FQHC requirements, and professional standards.
Serve as a senior clinical resource during regulatory reviews, surveys, significant clinical investigations, emergency response, and other matters requiring executive clinical leadership.
Ensure appropriate enterprise clinical policies, standards, protocols, and professional-practice expectations, including those for scope of practice, competency, privileging, peer review, and professional conduct.
Participate in executive leadership and organization-wide strategy, budgeting, resource allocation, organizational development, and decision-making.
Represent the clinical perspective in organizational decisions and promote interdisciplinary collaboration across clinical and organizational functions.
Partner with the COO to translate clinical standards and care-delivery requirements into operational processes while distinguishing clinical decision-making from operational execution.
Work with Operations and senior clinical leaders to identify and address mismatches in clinical capacity, patient demand, staffing, space, support staffing, and other resources.
Ensure provider deployment and coverage decisions account for patient access, continuity, competency, service-line needs, site capacity, support staffing, productivity, and organizational priorities.
Support coordinated and centralized provider scheduling and capacity-management approaches as organizational systems evolve.
Collaborate with Nursing and Clinical Support Services leadership to ensure support models, competencies, workflows, and staffing effectively support providers and patient care.
Identify organizational barriers to effective clinical care and work across departments to develop sustainable solutions.
Ensure appropriate clinical leadership participation in committees and governance structures addressing quality, patient safety, pharmacy, infection prevention, clinical practice, and related matters.
Advise the CEO and executive leadership on clinical strategy, workforce needs, emerging care models, regulatory developments, and opportunities to improve or expand services; provide clinical information, recommendations, and reports to the CEO and Board as appropriate.
Provide clinical leadership and oversight related to Zufall’s participation in the 340B Drug Pricing Program in collaboration with operational, financial, compliance, and pharmacy leadership.
Evaluate clinical implications of proposed programs, partnerships, locations, technologies, and service expansions, and participate in strategic planning.
Represent Zufall on clinical matters with hospitals, health systems, academic institutions, professional organizations, community partners, government agencies, and other external stakeholders.
Support strategic clinical affiliations, referral relationships, academic partnerships, residency and training opportunities, and other relationships that strengthen clinical programs and workforce.
Serve as an executive clinical spokesperson when appropriate and support community and professional initiatives aligned with Zufall’s mission and clinical strategy.
Perform other related duties as assigned by the Chief Executive Officer.