Director, Medical Education Strategic Operations and Institutional Initiatives

ThedaCare•Neenah, WI

11d•Onsite

About The Position

The Director of Medical Education Strategic Operations and Institutional Initiatives leads high-priority Medical Education projects that require system/region coordination, structured planning, and disciplined execution. This role supports program development, academic affiliation planning, workforce-aligned initiatives, clinical learning environment improvements, institutional reporting, and executive-level project management. The Director must understand the GME landscape, but the role is intentionally designed for a senior leader who can build plans, align stakeholders, manage risks, and deliver outcomes. The Director is responsible for Medical Education for ThedaCare supporting graduate medical education, undergraduate medical education, non-nursing education programs, continuing medical education, simulation, library and knowledge resources, north region non-cancer research, and potentially more programs across all north region locations. The Director will align with the Medical College of Wisconsin (MCW), and Medical College of Wisconsin and Affiliated Hospitals (MCWAH), and other regional educational organizations in establishing and promoting healthcare education in the north region and ensuring all contractual relationships are upheld to the highest standards.

Requirements

Bachelor’s Degree in healthcare administration, business administration, education, public health, project management, strategy, or related field required.
Seven or more years of experience in healthcare operations, academic medicine, GME, project management, strategy execution, clinical operations, or comparable complex environment required.
Demonstrated experience leading cross-functional projects with senior stakeholders and multiple operational dependencies.
Strong ability to develop workplans, meeting structures, executive summaries, dashboards, presentations, and decision-support materials.
Demonstrated ability to manage ambiguity, build alignment, and move initiatives forward without direct authority over all stakeholders.

Nice To Haves

Master’s degree in healthcare administration, business administration, public health, education, organizational leadership, or related field preferred.
PMP, Lean Six Sigma, change management, or comparable project management credential preferred.
Experience in a teaching hospital, sponsoring institution, health system strategy office, academic affairs division, or clinical operations leadership environment preferred.
Experience with new program development, academic affiliations, consortium models, clinical site expansion, or physician workforce initiatives preferred.
Familiarity with GME requirements, GMEC structures, trainee lifecycle operations, and clinical learning environment considerations preferred.

Responsibilities

Lead enterprise Medical Education projects from planning through implementation, including project charters, workplans, timelines, stakeholder maps, risks, decisions, and status reporting.
Support Medical Education strategic planning by translating leadership priorities into operational initiatives with clear owners and measurable milestones.
Coordinate high-priority initiatives related to program growth, new program feasibility, clinical site expansion, learner experience, and administrative infrastructure.
Prepare executive-ready summaries, decision memos, dashboards, and presentations for Medical Education leadership, system committees, and senior executives.
Maintain an institutional Medical Education initiative portfolio and track progress, dependencies, barriers, and resource needs.
Support operational planning for new residency and fellowship programs, including stakeholder coordination, timeline development, readiness assessments, and resource planning.
Coordinate with clinical departments, finance, HR, medical staff services, legal, facilities, IT, and external partners to support program development activities.
Develop templates and repeatable processes for new program planning, complement growth, participating site onboarding, and educational partnership implementation.
Support evaluation of program growth opportunities in relation to workforce needs, clinical capacity, faculty readiness, financial implications, and institutional priorities.
Monitor implementation risk and readiness for programs moving from concept to operational launch and scaling.
Serve as a project lead for Medical Education partnerships, participating site relationships, academic affiliations, consortium activities, and cross-institutional initiatives as assigned.
Coordinate stakeholder engagement across internal departments and external partner organizations to ensure timely communication and decision-making.
Support governance and operating model development for Medical Education partnerships, including roles, meeting structures, escalation pathways, and decision logs.
Partner with workforce planning, clinical operations, recruitment, and strategy teams to connect Medical Education activities to physician and clinician pipeline priorities.
Identify alignment gaps and recommend practical operating structures that improve accountability.
Assess existing workflows and recommend changes to improve Medical Education scalability, governance, communication, and operational discipline.
Support institutional readiness for major initiatives, including site visits, policy changes, faculty and trainee development projects/initiatives, and programmatic transitions.
Develop project tools, templates, dashboards, and standard operating structures that can be reused across multiple scenarios and strategic initiatives.
Partner with system Medical Education operations leaders to ensure strategic initiatives are integrated into routine operations after launch.
Facilitate post-implementation reviews to assess outcomes, lessons learned, and sustainability.
This role supports accreditation readiness indirectly by ensuring new initiatives, partnerships, program development activities, and institutional projects are operationally sound and properly documented. The Director should understand how accreditation considerations affect timelines and readiness but should not be positioned as the organization's primary accreditation technician. The emphasis should be strategic operations, program development support, and execution management.