Manager, Immunohematology Reference Lab

Gulf Coast Blood•Houston, TX

11d•Hybrid

About The Position

The Manager, Consultation & Reference Laboratory is responsible for the effective management and daily operations of the Consultation & Reference (C&R) Laboratory, ensuring the delivery of safe, accurate, timely, and high-quality laboratory services to patients, hospitals, healthcare providers, and internal customers. Reporting to the Director responsible for C&R Laboratory services, the position provides operational and technical leadership for laboratory operations, staff performance, quality and regulatory compliance, competency, customer service, resource management, and continuous improvement. The Manager serves as a key liaison with the Medical Director, internal departments, and external customers and is responsible for maintaining a high-performing, compliant, and customer-focused laboratory environment.

Requirements

Bachelor's degree in Medical Laboratory Science, Clinical Laboratory Science, Biomedical Science, Biology, or a related scientific/healthcare discipline OR Advanced degree in Healthcare Administration, Business Administration, Laboratory Management, or a related discipline preferred.
6 – 10 years of progressively responsible laboratory experience, preferably within a blood bank, transfusion service, reference laboratory, hospital laboratory, or similarly regulated laboratory environment.
5 - 10 years of supervisory or management experience preferred.
Demonstrated experience supervising laboratory personnel and managing day-to-day laboratory operations.
Demonstrated knowledge of laboratory quality management and regulatory requirements.
Experience with quality investigations, corrective actions, audits, inspections, or accreditation activities.
Experience with laboratory metrics, workload management, staffing, and resource planning.
Experience working collaboratively with medical leadership and cross-functional stakeholders.
Current professional certification appropriate to the laboratory discipline, specifically certification as a Specialist in Blood Banking (SBB) or international equivalent, as required by the position and applicable regulatory requirements.
Maintains all required certifications, licenses, registrations, and continuing education requirements.

Nice To Haves

Blood banking/transfusion medicine experience.
Immunohematology Reference Laboratory experience.
Experience with complex immunohematology/reference testing.
Knowledge of FDA, AABB, and CLIA requirements.
SBB certification or international equivalent
Experience with regulatory inspections and accreditation surveys.
Experience with quality improvement and laboratory performance management.
Experience with laboratory information systems and data analysis.
Demonstrated experience developing and mentoring laboratory professionals.
Experience managing staffing and resources in a highly service-dependent laboratory environment.

Responsibilities

Manages daily C&R Laboratory operations, ensuring safe, accurate, timely, efficient, and compliant service delivery.
Ensures appropriate staffing, scheduling, workflow, workload distribution, and operational coverage across multiple shifts.
Monitors and reports on laboratory workload, turnaround times, productivity, quality indicators, and service performance and addresses issues as appropriate.
Ensures compliance with applicable FDA, AABB, CLIA, OSHA, accreditation, and organizational requirements.
Maintains effective quality control and quality assurance practices and ensures appropriate investigation, documentation, escalation, and resolution of quality events.
Supports regulatory inspections, accreditation surveys, audits, and internal assessments and ensures findings are appropriately addressed.
Ensures laboratory policies, procedures, SOPs, forms, and technical documentation are maintained and current.
Provides technical and operational leadership to laboratory staff and ensures required qualifications, training, and competency are maintained.
Oversees initial and ongoing competency assessments and addresses identified skill or training gaps.
Partners with the Medical Director and appropriate technical leaders on complex laboratory, quality, and patient-care matters.
Supports the evaluation and implementation of new methodologies, equipment, technologies, and process improvements.
Communicates technical results and recommendations to hospital blood banks, physicians, and transfusion services.
Directly supervises, coaches, and develops laboratory staff and establishes clear performance expectations, goals, and accountability.
Supports onboarding, training, performance management, employee engagement, retention, and professional development.
Identifies staffing, capability, and succession needs and supports development of a strong technical workforce.
Promotes a culture of teamwork, accountability, professionalism, safety, and continuous learning.
Maintains effective relationships with hospitals, healthcare providers, internal departments, and other C&R customers.
Serves as a point of escalation for customer, operational, and technical issues and ensures timely resolution.
Communicates laboratory capabilities, service expectations, requirements, and changes to relevant stakeholders.
Works collaboratively with the Medical Director and other departments to support coordinated, high-quality service delivery.
Supports preparation and monitoring of the annual C&R Laboratory budget and promotes responsible use of departmental resources.
Provides input into staffing, equipment, supplies, technology, and other resource requirements.
Compiles, reviews, and reports laboratory operational and quality statistics and uses data to identify trends, risks, and improvement opportunities.
Provides regular updates to leadership on laboratory performance, staffing, quality, customer service, and operational issues.
Identifies and implements opportunities to improve laboratory processes, workflow, quality, turnaround time, customer service, and operational efficiency.
Participates in investigations, root-cause analysis, corrective and preventive actions, and other quality improvement activities.
Promotes a culture in which employees identify and appropriately escalate quality, safety, and compliance concerns.
Ensures employees understand and comply with organizational policies, laboratory procedures, safety requirements, confidentiality, EEO, and other applicable organizational standards.
Performs other duties as assigned. Management retains discretion to add to or modify responsibilities based on organizational needs.