Senior Regional External Communications Program Manager

Banner Health•Ottawa, OH

1d•Hybrid

About The Position

Banner's Marketing team is a dynamic, mission-driven department that serves as the voice of Banner Health. We are committed to elevating the Banner brand by connecting our communities with the exceptional care, innovation, and compassion that define our organization. Our team works in close partnership with senior leadership, clinical providers, and the corporate marketing team to ensure consistent, strategic, and impactful communications that align with Banner's broader organizational goals. We serve as trusted advisors and strategic partners — both internally across departments and externally with media, community stakeholders, and the public — helping to build and protect Banner's reputation as one of the nation's leading nonprofit health systems. No two days look the same in this fast-paced role, but you must be a self starter and able to work independently and on a team. As a PR professional supporting Banner's Western Region, you will spend your days crafting press releases, proactively pitching positive stories to media partners, and responding to media inquiries in collaboration with senior leadership and providers. Based primarily in Casper, Wyoming, you will serve hospitals and clinics across the region, creating content for social media platforms while maintaining strong, positive relationships with both internal teams and external partners. The ideal candidate brings at least five years of experience in journalism, public relations, and marketing, along with a passion for storytelling and a proactive, solutions-oriented mindset. This is a great opportunity to grow your career within a large, integrated health system. Majority of work will be on-site at Wyoming Medical Center with some hybrid days Monday - Friday 8am - 5pm Within Banner Health Corporate, you will have the opportunity to apply your unique experience and expertise in support of a nationally-recognized healthcare leader. We offer stimulating and rewarding careers in a wide array of disciplines. Whether your background is in Human Resources, Finance, Information Technology, Legal, Managed Care Programs or Public Relations, you'll find many options for contributing to our award-winning patient care. POSITION SUMMARY This position manages Banner Health marketing and public relations for a designated Banner region to ensure the organization’s external communications and outreach aligns with Banner’s brand strategy and voice. This position creates and maintains positive relationships with internal and external constituencies through the utilization of a variety of media activities and techniques which present the organization's position and business case to a broad or select group of constituencies. The position is expected to work autonomously, exercise sound judgment in decision-making, and demonstrate advanced expertise across multiple functional areas of public relations (earned media, content, social media, community engagement, etc.). This position will interpret internal and external business challenges and recommend best practices to improve services, processes or products. The position will solve complex problems, taking a broad perspective including coordination with others outside their own work unit, to identify innovative solutions. This role provides strategic guidance, mentors team members, and manages complex, cross-functional initiatives that align with organizational objectives. This position will anticipate customer needs; assess requirements and identify new solutions, interacting primarily with department and cross-department peers, supervisor, customers, peers’ managers, patients and physicians. The individual will make decisions guided by policies in non-standard situations. The position will monitor and control costs of own work and may manage budgets for moderate sized projects or programs.

Requirements

Must possess comprehensive knowledge of public relations, earned media industry process and/or marketing as normally obtained through the completion of a Bachelor’s degree in Business Administration, Marketing, Journalism, Communications or related field, or equivalent working knowledge in the field of Public Relations, Communications or Marketing.
Skill level typically achieved through five to seven years' progressive experience experience in public relations, communications, and/or marketing, with demonstrated leadership or project management experience.
Possesses ability to manage multiple projects and initiatives simultaneously.
Excellent writing, editing and presentation skills.
Must possess excellent organizational and planning skills.
Superior project management and time management skills.
Self-motivated and great interpersonal skills.
Strong strategic thinking, analytical, and problem-solving abilities required.
Demonstrated ability to influence stakeholders and manage competing priorities.
Sensitivity to public perceptions and their implications/interpretation is required.

Nice To Haves

A working knowledge of major trends in health care, mass communication and the earned media industry process is preferred.
Knowledge and experience with nonprofit marketing communications preferred.
Experience managing budgets, vendors, and cross-functional teams preferred.
Experience in a healthcare provider environment is preferred.
Additional related education and/or experience preferred.

Responsibilities

Supports the senior regional marketing & public relations program director on all marketing and public relations activities in the market.
Leads and coordinates one or more teams to create content strategies specific to those groups and serves as primary liaison to help coordinate and manage broader workflow objectives.
Works to maintain a positive reputation for the organization and manage any reputational risks that might surface in the designated region.
Develops, implements, and evaluates efficient corporate communications strategies and applies standardized and best-practice communication methods to ensure maximum leverage of strategic messaging and other pertinent information across the organization or to selected audiences.
Identifies opportunities for process improvement and innovation.
Manages all inbound requests and outbound messaging from/to news media in the designated region and serves as Banner spokesperson as needed.
Manages proactive earned media outreach through pitches, press releases and digital postings that increase customer preference and awareness of the Banner brand.
Ensures that topics effectively promote Banner Health’s mission, values, vision, brand and other organizational strategies and priorities.
Ensures that appropriate spokespeople are chosen to represent the Banner Health brand in earned media interviews.
This includes the implementation of a standard earned media briefing for interviewees that helps orient them to interview context and questions.
Collaborates with other areas of Customer & Brand Experience (CBE) to guarantee maximum leveraging of earned media across multiple communications platforms and audiences.
Keeps key regional stakeholders informed of all media activities that present risk to Banner Health’s public reputation.
Likewise, informs them of additional coverage that positions Banner as the leading health provider in the market.
Manages and oversees special projects or initiative teams that need CBE support to ensure success.
Develops strategic recommendations on tactics and strategies to enhance work group performance.
Serves as strategic lead on a variety of special projects, groups and entity committees.
Provides guidance and mentorship to team members and cross-functional partners.
Mentors and develops junior team members, providing guidance on best practices, professional development, and career growth opportunities.
May participate in hiring and onboarding processes for the department.
Leads and manages projects that are often complex in nature, are primarily digital, and have wide organizational impact.
Projects may require evaluation of technology requirements, technical troubleshooting and development of documentation for training purposes.
Manages relationships with Visual Designer and outsourced creative vendors to ensure adherence to brand standards, project objectives and timelines.
Serves as strategic advisor to internal clients and stakeholders to ensure projects meet objectives and expectations.
Monitors project performance metrics and provides regular reporting to leadership.
Manages budgets and resources for assigned projects and initiatives, ensuring cost-effectiveness and optimal allocation of resources.
Tracks ROI and provides data-driven insights to inform future strategic decisions.
Participates in entity disaster committees to ensure appropriate communications support is provided for successful disaster management and participates in on-call rotation to serve as earned media resource to respond to unanticipated entity or corporate events/situations.