Director, Education, Professional Practice and Nursing Excellence

Stanford Health Care Tri-Valley•Livermore, CA

13d•$87 - $116

About The Position

The Director of Education, Professional Practice and Nursing Excellence provides strategic and operational leadership for nursing and interprofessional education, professional practice, workforce development, competency management, nursing excellence, evidence-based practice, research, and clinical inquiry across Stanford Health Care Tri-Valley. The Director establishes integrated strategies, standards, and infrastructure to advance clinical competence, professional development, practice excellence, workforce readiness, and knowledge generation and dissemination. Programs align with organizational priorities, nursing strategic goals, clinical outcomes, regulatory requirements, and recognized standards of excellence. In partnership with designated medical directors, the Director serves as the nursing and administrative dyadic leader for medical education and research. The role advances coordinated interprofessional education, simulation, clinical scholarship, academic partnerships, and research initiatives that strengthen collaboration among nurses, physicians, advanced practice providers, and other healthcare professionals. The Director leads departmental strategy, operations, staffing, performance management, budgeting, resource allocation, contracts, technology, and program evaluation. The role oversees education and professional development, professional practice standards, nursing excellence and governance, evidence-based practice and research, physician and interprofessional partnerships, workforce development, academic partnerships, and regulatory and financial stewardship. The Director also represents the department in organizational leadership forums and establishes measures demonstrating program impact. The Director performs responsibilities in alignment with Stanford Health Care’s commitment to an exceptional patient and family experience and demonstrates C-I-CARE standards in interactions with patients, families, employees, learners, physicians, community partners, and colleagues. Stanford Health Care is an equal opportunity employer and encourages qualified applicants from diverse backgrounds to apply.

Requirements

Bachelor’s degree in Nursing from an accredited college or university.
Master’s degree in Nursing, Nursing Education, Healthcare Administration, Organizational Leadership, or a related field.
Seven or more years of progressively responsible nursing experience.
Five or more years of leadership experience in nursing education, professional development, professional practice, nursing excellence, research, quality improvement, or a related clinical area.
Demonstrated experience leading teams, complex programs, organizational change, and cross-functional initiatives.
Experience with budgeting, resource allocation, program evaluation, and executive reporting.
Active California Registered Nurse license.
Ability to provide strategic and operational leadership across complex clinical and educational programs.
Advanced knowledge of nursing professional development, adult learning, competency management, professional practice, and evidence-based care.
Knowledge of nursing excellence frameworks, professional governance, professional practice models, research, and clinical scholarship.
Ability to establish effective dyadic and cross-disciplinary relationships with nursing, physician, operational, research, and academic leaders.
Demonstrated change-management, project-management, consultation, facilitation, and conflict-resolution skills.
Strong financial, analytical, and resource-management capabilities.
Ability to develop meaningful measures of clinical, educational, workforce, operational, and financial outcomes.
Excellent written, verbal, presentation, influence, and executive-communication skills.
Commitment to professional growth, inclusion, collaboration, and psychologically safe learning environments.
Proficiency with learning-management systems, data-reporting tools, and Microsoft applications.

Nice To Haves

Doctoral degree in Nursing, Education, Healthcare Administration, or a related field.
Experience with competency management, professional governance, transition-to-practice programs, simulation, evidence-based practice, or nursing research.
Experience supporting a nursing excellence designation.
Experience developing physician partnerships, interprofessional education, academic affiliations, or research infrastructure.
Certification in a relevant clinical, education, research, quality, or project-management specialty.

Responsibilities

Establish and execute an organization-wide strategy for education, professional practice, workforce development, nursing excellence, research, and inquiry.
Translate organizational and nursing priorities into measurable departmental goals, programs, and multiyear roadmaps.
Lead departmental operations, including staffing, performance management, budgeting, resource allocation, contracts, technology, and program evaluation.
Recruit, develop, and lead a multidisciplinary team responsible for education, professional practice, simulation, workforce development, nursing excellence, and research.
Represent the department on organizational committees, leadership forums, and strategic initiatives, and establish measures demonstrating departmental impact.
Provide strategic oversight for nursing and interprofessional education, orientation, onboarding, continuing education, simulation, transition-to-practice programs, and specialty development.
Establish organization-wide standards for learning-needs assessment, curriculum development, competency validation, program evaluation, and educational recordkeeping.
Ensure education addresses clinical practice, policy, equipment, technology, service, regulatory, and performance-gap changes; oversee learning-management-system administration, continuing-education processes, certification tracking, and required reporting.
Partner with clinical and operational leaders to ensure staff have the knowledge and skills needed to provide safe, high-quality care.
Lead nursing professional practice standards and promote integration of the Nursing Professional Practice Model into practice, education, decision-making, orientation, and professional governance.
Oversee professional practice consultation on policies, clinical guidelines, standards of care, clinical pathways, new services, and changes in practice; align policies, education, competencies, workflows, and regulatory requirements.
Lead change-management efforts supporting implementation and sustained adoption of evidence-based practices and new models of care.
Lead the nursing excellence strategy and preparation for a future nursing excellence designation, including readiness assessments, performance monitoring, evidence development, communications, and improvement plans.
Advance shared decision-making and professional governance; develop strategies for certification, academic advancement, mentoring, succession planning, recognition, engagement, and retention.
Coordinate nursing excellence dashboards, reports, presentations, and communications, and promote recognition of nursing outcomes, innovation, leadership, and scholarship.
Establish infrastructure, governance, consultation, education, mentorship, and standardized tools for evidence-based practice, nursing research, innovation, and clinical scholarship.
Build staff capability to distinguish research, evidence-based practice, quality improvement, and performance improvement; support project development, literature review, implementation, outcome measurement, regulatory review, and dissemination.
Develop partnerships with research offices, academic institutions, clinical experts, and community organizations; promote dissemination through presentations, posters, publications, conferences, research events, and professional forums.
Measure research participation, evidence-based practice adoption, scholarly dissemination, and impact on clinical outcomes.
Serve as the nursing and administrative dyadic partner to designated medical directors for medical education and research; lead initiatives to strengthen clinical research infrastructure, education oversight, and interdisciplinary collaboration.
Develop shared strategies, governance, goals, and performance measures for interprofessional education and research; coordinate nursing and medical education to strengthen team-based learning and align clinical priorities.
Partner with physician leaders to expand simulation, faculty and preceptor engagement, learner experiences, academic affiliations, clinical scholarship, and research activity.
Support an organizational research roadmap and coordinated infrastructure for clinical research and clinical-trial activities; promote collaborative inquiry and dissemination across healthcare disciplines.
Develop workforce strategies for recruitment, onboarding, transition to practice, retention, career advancement, and succession planning.
Oversee nursing and non-nursing career pathways, student placements, clinical affiliations, internships, residency programs, and academic partnerships.
Build employee pathways into specialty, educator, research, advanced-practice, and leadership roles; strengthen preceptor, mentor, clinical-instructor, and faculty-development programs.
Evaluate workforce programs using competency, retention, advancement, engagement, completion, and workforce-readiness outcomes.
Ensure departmental programs comply with applicable professional, regulatory, accreditation, licensing, and continuing-education requirements.
Partner with Patient Safety, Quality, Accreditation, Infection Prevention, Risk Management, Human Resources, Nursing Informatics, and clinical leaders.
Use clinical outcomes, workforce trends, regulatory findings, and learner feedback to identify priorities and evaluate effectiveness.
Ensure appropriate education and competency responses to regulatory findings, corrective actions, high-risk processes, and new clinical services.
Promote financially responsible program design, resource stewardship, and reduction of unnecessary variation and duplication.
Perform responsibilities in alignment with Stanford Health Care’s patient and family experience commitment and demonstrate C-I-CARE standards.