JOB SUMMARY The Associate Vice President (AVP), Neuroscience Services is a senior executive leadership position responsible for enterprise strategy, operations, financial stewardship, quality, growth, access, and performance of the Neuroscience Service Line and Spine Center across UT Southwestern Medical Center and Health System. The AVP partners directly with the Executive Clinical Director for Neuroscience in a physician-administrator dyad to advance clinical excellence, innovation, patient experience, and sustainable service line growth across inpatient, outpatient, procedural, rehabilitation, ambulatory, hospital based, and network settings. As a member of both the Peter O'Donnell Jr. Brain Institute and Health System leadership teams, the AVP reports jointly to the Executive Director of the Brain Institute and the Health System Chief Operating Officer. The AVP collaborates with department chairs, physician leaders, hospital executives, Medical Group leadership, ambulatory operations, nursing, quality, finance, and strategy to execute an integrated neuroscience strategy that advances UT Southwestern's missions of patient care, research, education, innovation, and discovery, including development of clinical operations that, where appropriate, facilitate clinical and translational research while maintaining outstanding patient care and operational performance.
BENEFITS UT Southwestern is proud to offer a competitive and comprehensive benefits package to eligible employees. Our benefits are designed to support your overall wellbeing, and include:
- PPO medical plan, available day one at no cost for full-time employee-only coverage
- 100% coverage for preventive healthcare-no copay
- Paid Time Off, available day one
- Retirement Programs through the Teacher Retirement System of Texas (TRS)
- Paid Parental Leave Benefit
- Wellness programs
- Tuition Reimbursement
- Public Service Loan Forgiveness (PSLF) Qualified Employer
- Learn more about these and other UTSW employee benefits!
QUALIFICATIONS EXPERIENCE AND EDUCATION Required - Education
Master's Degree in Healthcare Administration, Business Administration, Public Health, or related field
- Experience
10+ years of progressively responsible healthcare leadership experience in an academic medical center, integrated delivery system, complex health system, or large multi-site healthcare organization.
Required experience leading multidisciplinary clinical programs, service lines, or multi-site operations; strategic planning, physician engagement; and personnel management.
Preferred - Experience
Neuroscience, academic medicine, dyad leadership, market expansion, access improvement, network development, and matrixed governance experience preferred.
JOB DUTIES - Strategic Leadership and Service Line Development
- Develops and executes annual and multi-year strategies for service line growth, access, quality, innovation, operational excellence, and financial sustainability.
- Identifies opportunities to expand clinical programs, geographic reach, referral networks, market share, and patient access throughout North Texas and beyond.
- Partners with Brain Institute and departmental leadership to develop clinical infrastructure, workflows, and operational capabilities that support clinical and translational neuroscience research, balancing research needs with efficient, high-quality patient care.
- Leads business planning for new programs, care models, technologies, facilities, and partnerships that advance UT Southwestern's neuroscience enterprise.
- Establishes service line priorities, performance goals, dashboards, and accountability structures across neuroscience programs and specialties.
- Dyad Leadership and Governance
- Serves as administrative co-leader with the Executive Clinical Director for Neuroscience and shares accountability for service line strategy and performance.
- Co-leads service line governance, operating reviews, strategic planning, and enterprise performance improvement initiatives.
- Aligns physician engagement, clinical program development, academic priorities, innovation, and operational execution through a transparent dyad governance model.
- Partners with the Spine Center Director and oversight committee to advance Spine Center activity, quality, and growth in the metroplex.
- Coordinates with Neuroscience and Spine Center clinical departments‿ leadership on faculty and APP recruitment that supports the goals of the clinical operation.
- Operational Leadership
- Provides executive coordination of neuroscience operations across inpatient, ambulatory, procedural, rehabilitation, and network settings.
- Partners with hospital, clinic, and physician leaders to improve patient flow, throughput, care coordination, capacity management, and standardization of key processes.
- Facilitates collaboration among Neurology, Neurosurgery, Psychiatry, Physical Medicine & Rehabilitation, Radiology, Neuropsychology, Orthopedics, Anesthesiology and related specialties.
- Identifies and resolves operational barriers affecting access, care coordination, quality, patient experience, financial performance, or growth.
- In partnership with the Spine Center Director and Ambulatory leadership, oversees the clinical operations of the Spine Center.
- Works collaboratively with clinical, research, and administrative leaders to identify operational opportunities that enhance clinical research participation, data collection, and innovation while minimizing disruption to clinical operations and patient access.
- Financial Performance
- Maintains accountability for financial performance, including revenue growth, operating margin, resource utilization, cost management, and capital planning.
- Collaborates with finance to develop operating plans, business cases, pro formas, forecasts, and return-on-investment assessments.
- Monitors performance through financial, operational, quality, and growth dashboards and implements corrective action when needed.
- Ensures effective internal controls, safeguards assets, and supports responsible stewardship of institutional resources.
- Growth, Access, and Network Development
- Leads initiatives to improve patient access, reduce wait times, optimize scheduling, improve capacity utilization, and enhance patient navigation.
- Partners with physician relations, marketing, business development, and outreach teams to strengthen referral pipelines and regional and national presence.
- Develops outreach strategies, affiliations, and partnerships to support growth of tertiary and quaternary neuroscience services.
- Uses referral patterns, demand data, access constraints, and market analysis to guide growth strategies.
- Quality, Outcomes, and Patient Experience
- Establishes expectations for quality, safety, outcomes, patient experience, and continuous improvement across the service line.
- Supports national certifications, accreditations, recognitions, and external benchmark performance.
- Partners with clinical and quality leaders to improve outcomes, reduce variation, strengthen evidence-based practice, and enhance care coordination.
- Leads performance reviews and monitors key indicators for access, volume, quality, patient experience, financial performance, and operations.
- Performs other duties as assigned.
Knowledge, Skills and Abilities - Ability to effectively interpret and apply organizational policies, procedures, and systems.
- Excellent supervisory, customer service, and written and verbal communication skills.
- Ability to plan, organize, coordinate, and supervise work of employees as necessary to ensure desired results are achieved.
- Ability to monitor and maintain budget.
- Executive leadership, strategic planning, healthcare operations, service line management, finance, business planning, and growth.
- Ability to lead complex matrixed organizations through influence, collaboration, communication, and accountability.
- Strong understanding of academic medicine and alignment of clinical, research, educational, and innovation missions, including the operational requirements necessary to support discovery within a high-performing clinical enterprise.
- Expertise in physician engagement, relationship-building, negotiation, presentation, analytics, benchmarking, quality improvement, patient access, and performance management.
