The University of Florida Health Physicians (UFHP) is the ambulatory practice of the University of Florida College of Medicine and supports its clinical mission. UF Health Physicians oversees practice operations for the College of Medicine, including ambulatory clinic activities, the Patient Access Center, and the physician revenue cycle. More than fifty practices are in operation within Gainesville and around North and Central Florida, with over 1,000 clinical faculty and 900 clinical, administrative, and revenue cycle support staff providing patient care and related services for UF Health Physicians. The practice generates in excess of 800,000 visits annually and has experienced significant growth over the past several years.

UFHP is committed to partnering with UF faculty in delivering excellent care and support to our patients and their families. We aim to provide easy access to our services as well as an overall positive experience for our patients, and rely on an excellent clinical and administrative team to meet our goals.

The Opportunity

The University of Florida Health Physicians invites applications and nominations for a dynamic and newly created position of Director for Patient Access. Working directly with the Vice President for Ambulatory Operations, under the leadership of CEO for UF Health Physicians and Senior Associate Dean for Faculty Practices, the Director will be responsible for leadership and oversight of ambulatory patient access across UF Health. The greater goal for this position is to identify opportunities and implementing strategies, that lead to an exceptional experience for our patients and referral sources.

The Director of Patient Access will serve as the UF Health subject matter expert on patient access and work in partnership with clinical chairs, faculty and clinical operational leaders to develop and lead rapid and sustained improvement in patient access metrics. As a member of the UFHP senior leadership team, you will be responsible for all aspects of access management including overseeing the ambulatory access center, directing scheduling and template standards, ensuring that effective and cutting-edge technology is in place to support access and monitoring and reporting on UF Health capacity metrics for individual specialties.

A successful candidate will be a customer-focused and results-oriented leader with excellent communication and presentation skills and have the ability to build and manage high performing teams.

Key Responsibilities:

Access Operations Oversight

• Oversees all aspects of ambulatory patient access including capacity analysis, patient access center performance, customer service quality in the area of access, technology assessment and management and the access space.
• Coordinates with internal stakeholders to improve access to care for our patients, including clinical departmental chairs, division chiefs, clinical faculty, departmental administrators and UF Health leadership.
• Collaborates with referring providers to improve access to care for patients.
• Collaborates with IT on the design and optimization of access related tools and technology. Oversees the alignment of staffing, processes and technology to optimize clinical access. Oversees the development and maintenance of clinical schedule templates, and scheduling and referral policies.
• Supports the operating needs of clinics, departments, health system and institutes.
• Develops and manages annual operating and capital budgets for patient access. Assists in identifying opportunities for expense savings and revenue enhancement. Monitors and analyzes budget variances.

Stakeholder Communication

• Develops best practices for access and capacity management and establishes processes for evaluation and improvement of service standards and performance metrics.
• Regularly reports access metrics to key stakeholders including clinical chairs and departments, UF Health leadership and the Florida Clinical Practice Association Board of Directors.

Proposing and Implementing Recommendations that Increase Access

• Develops standard and reliable processes for assessing capacity needs. For areas with constrained access, works with clinical and administrative leadership to identify and implement specific strategies for enhanced access.
• Champions new approaches for addressing patient access needs including online scheduling and e-services.
• Coordinates with marketing and business development to grow new patient volumes for key services
• Accountable for achieving significant continuous improvement on access metrics and the access components of patient satisfaction surveys.
• Provides global direction and input for UF Health Physicians access strategy by developing short-term and long-term access and operational goals.

Staying Abreast of National Best Access Practices

• Maintains an in-depth knowledge of the patient access industry monitoring current trends, best practices and best in class performance examples.
• Represents UF Health at national and regional levels in the area of patient access.

Join our Winning Team in The City of Gainesville!

Gainesville (http://cityofgainesville.org/) is home to Florida's largest and oldest university, and so is one of the state's centers of education, medicine, cultural events and athletics. The University of Florida and UF Health Shands Hospital are the leading employers in Gainesville and provide jobs for many residents of surrounding counties. Gainesville is also the largest city in Alachua County and is the county seat, with approximately 269,000 residents county-wide. It serves as the cultural, educational, and commercial center for the north central Florida region. Known for its preservation of historic buildings and the beauty of its natural surroundings, Gainesville's numerous parks, museums and lakes provide entertainment to thousands of visitors. The city is in a wonderful central location, providing easy access within a day’s drive to beaches, nature preserves, theme parks, and sporting activities. Explore Gainesville in 60 Seconds.

Our Commitment to Inclusive Excellence

The University of Florida Health Physicians in partnership with the UF College of Medicine is committed to diversity, inclusion and heath equity through the efforts of actively finding, developing and including the best talent to support our vision of being “a premier institution focused on promoting health and alleviating human suffering through exceptional education, discovery, innovation and patient-centered health care of the highest quality.”

As an Equal Opportunity Employer, the UF Health is committed to non-discrimination with respect to race, creed, color, religion, age, disability, sex, sexual orientation, gender identify and expression, marital status, national origin, political opinions or affiliations, genetic information and veteran status in also aspects of employment including recruitment, hiring, promotion, transfers, discipline, terminations, wage and salary administration, benefits and training.

Commensurate with education and experience.

Masters degree in an appropriate area and six years of relevant experience; or a bachelors degree in an appropriate area and eight years of relevant experience.

• Master’s degree in business or healthcare, or the equivalent level of experience including no less than ten years of leadership experience in the healthcare sector.
• Previous experience in a complex and matrixed environment such as an academic medical center or a large integrated health system.
• Proven ability to implement change and continuous improvement with an understanding of systems engineering and design in the use of data analytics to drive quality and performance improvement.
• Experience in leading quality safety and performance improvement initiatives.
• Demonstrated experience working collaboratively with physicians and senior clinical leadership.
• Effective communication skills both in written and verbal presentation with a
• communication style that is open and foster trust, credibility and understanding.
• Effective team builder. Maintains the ability to build and lead high-performance teams.
• Self-directed strategic thinker who understands the larger picture and is goal oriented to create tactics and strategies to achieve the larger goal.

In order to be considered, you must upload your cover letter and resume.

The University of Florida is committed to non-discrimination with respect to race, creed, color, religion, age, disability, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity and expression, marital status, national origin, political opinions or affiliations, genetic information and veteran status in all aspects of employment including recruitment, hiring, promotions, transfers, discipline, terminations, wage and salary administration, benefits, and training.

This is a time limited position.

Application must be submitted by 11:55 p.m. (ET) of the posting end date.