Director, Transformation and Ambulatory Quality & Safety

University of California, Irvine•Orange, CA

13d•Onsite

About The Position

The Director, Patient Safety Reliability and Transformation is responsible for the strategic and operational leadership, administrative oversight, and systemwide coordination of all patient safety, high reliability, and performance improvement functions across UCI Health. The incumbent is accountable for the development and execution of an integrated approach that aligns patient safety, performance improvement, and system transformation to achieve zero preventable harm, optimize patient outcomes, and drive sustainable organizational change in alignment with regulatory, accreditation, and organizational standards. This role maintains accountability for the design and implementation of comprehensive programs to minimize patient harm through the development of systems that advance a culture of safety, proactively identify risk, encourage adverse event reporting, and promote thoughtful, learning-oriented analysis of safety events and near misses across all assigned areas. The Director leads the development and implementation of departmental goals, policies, and performance improvement initiatives, and is responsible for the selection, onboarding, competency validation, performance evaluation, and professional development of all assigned coworkers. This position serves as a key liaison to all healthcare services, nursing, clinical and administrative departments, medical staff organizations, and committees throughout UCI Health, collaborating with executive and senior leadership to ensure patient safety and high reliability principles are integrated across the enterprise. The Director exercises wide latitude of authority in determining departmental goals and measures to achieve systemwide patient safety, reliability, and transformation objectives with limited oversight.

Requirements

Successful track record of effective, team-oriented working relationships with physicians, nurses and other health professionals
Outstanding negotiation, written, and verbal communication skills
Outstanding listening, interpersonal relationship building, and problem-solving skills
Knowledge of current trends and best practices in healthcare quality improvement and patient safety
Exceptional level of professionalism, discretion and the ability to work on highly sensitive and confidential projects
Deep understanding of HRO principles, Just Culture, and safety science
Bachelor's Degree in related field
Able to prioritize and manage multiple projects simultaneously with demonstrated ability to complete projects successfully on time and within budget
7+ years of experience in healthcare quality and patient safety with demonstrated ability in design, implementation and sustainment of performance improvement activities in a health care setting including skillful application of continuous quality improvement and patient safety sciences
5+ years of progressive administrative leadership experience in quality improvement, performance improvement, operational excellence or patient safety in an academic medical center or large, integrated, tertiary health care setting providing expert level understanding of the art and the science of quality improvement and patient safety
Must be able to provide proof of work authorization

Nice To Haves

Record of presentations at regional and/or national meetings focused on quality and patient safety
MSN or Masters in related field
Lean Six Sigma Black Belt highly preferred
Experience in Lean Six Sigma as an improvement methodology
Current Certified Professional in Healthcare Quality, CPHQ

Responsibilities

Strategic and operational leadership, administrative oversight, and systemwide coordination of all patient safety, high reliability, and performance improvement functions across UCI Health.
Development and execution of an integrated approach that aligns patient safety, performance improvement, and system transformation to achieve zero preventable harm, optimize patient outcomes, and drive sustainable organizational change.
Design and implementation of comprehensive programs to minimize patient harm through the development of systems that advance a culture of safety, proactively identify risk, encourage adverse event reporting, and promote thoughtful, learning-oriented analysis of safety events and near misses.
Development and implementation of departmental goals, policies, and performance improvement initiatives.
Selection, onboarding, competency validation, performance evaluation, and professional development of all assigned coworkers.
Serve as a key liaison to all healthcare services, nursing, clinical and administrative departments, medical staff organizations, and committees throughout UCI Health.
Collaborate with executive and senior leadership to ensure patient safety and high reliability principles are integrated across the enterprise.