Chief Strategy and Operations Officer

Department
BSD MED - General Internal Medicine

Job Summary
This role serves as the strategic and operational executive leader partnering directly with the Vice Dean and Senior Vice President for AI, Precision Medicine, and Data Analytics. Operating across both the Biological Sciences Division (BSD) and UChicago Medicine (UCMC), the position oversees the execution of a multi-year enterprise strategy to unify clinical informatics, research informatics, omics, AI, and precision medicine. The role bridges academic research and clinical operations, directing resource allocation, cross-functional governance, large-scale infrastructural growth, and institutional partnerships, including integration with external and university institutions such as Argonne National Labs, Booth, and Polsky.

The role will ensure the development and execution of research initiatives, scientific programs and event planning, funding opportunities and grants, external partnerships, and donor-facing activities in coordination with faculty and University leadership. The role supports the recruitment and hiring of talent to develop the organizational capacity to execute at scale including overseeing a multi-year investment plan and supervising staff, and serves as a senior problem-solver and primary point of contact for internal and external constituencies. This position demands visionary leadership, sophisticated stakeholder influence, and the ability to translate scientific opportunity into institutional and industry impact.

Responsibilities

• Lead the coordination, consolidation, and operationalization of UChicago's distributed informatics, AI, and precision medicine capabilities into a unified enterprise structure.
• Manage consolidated budgets, personnel strategies, and enterprise-wide funding allocations to support core strategic priorities across the biomedical enterprise.
• Support the development of a democratized clinical-research data platform integrating the electronic health record (EHR), multiomics, imaging, digital pathology, and participant-mediated data in close partnership with UCMC IT and leadership.
• Support the integration of real-time and participant-mediated data including wearables, remote monitoring, patient-reported outcomes, and sociomic data elements into the core platform architecture.
• Help direct and establish adoption of the strategy, scaling, and execution of precision medicine efforts, including from research to clinical implementation and translation efforts.
• Conduct internal and community engagement, managing internal and external advisory boards to position UChicago as a national leader in clinical biobanking.
• Drive internal collaboration across university powerhouses, including Argonne National Labs, the Harris School of Public Policy, the Booth School of Business, the Physical Sciences Division, the Pritzker School of Molecular Engineering, and the Polsky Center.
• Cultivate and manage external affiliate partnerships, including UChicago Medicine AdventHealth collaborative hospitals, regional health systems, and industry leaders in sequencing, proteomics, digital pathology, AI, and multimodal analytics.
• Partner with academic and clinical leadership to execute division-wide strategic faculty searches in areas such as artificial intelligence in biomedicine, clinical/computational phenomics, and pharmacogenomics.
• Oversee the strategic deployment of multi-year enterprise investment plans and start-up packages to build a world-class team of researchers, clinician-scientists, and operational experts.
• Partner with University Development to drive philanthropic engagement, external grant opportunities and writing, industry co-investments, and commercialization strategies to ensure long-term financial sustainability.
• Oversee day-to-day department operations, directly supervise staff, and establish organizational capacity to execute goals at scale.
• Serve as senior problem-solver and primary operational point of contact for internal and external constituencies across BSD and UCMC.
• Manages multiple related teams. Establishes department priorities, is responsible for the management of the center budget, allocates resources and executes strategic plans.
• Works closely with faculty, students and other leaders across campus to foster experimentation and multi-disciplinary inquiry and teaching by coordinating and developing Center programming. This may include workshops. Conferences, colloquia, training programs, community outreach, etc.
• Performs other related work as needed.

Minimum Qualifications

Education:
Minimum requirements include a college or university degree in related field.

Work Experience:
Minimum requirements include knowledge and skills developed through 10+ years of work experience in a related job discipline.

Certifications:

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Preferred Qualifications

Education:

• MBA and/or advanced degree in the sciences.

Experience:

• Background in biomedical research and university administration.
• Proven track record as a strong strategic thinker with a results orientation, who approaches any challenge with thoughtfulness, drive, data usage, and appropriate urgency.

Preferred Competencies

• Demonstrated ability to translate complex ideas into clear, compelling, and thoughtful messaging.
• Cultivating relationships and working with multiple stakeholders to build successful partnerships.
• Leading a data-driven team towards meeting organizational goals and objectives.
• Ability to work in an academic unit and/or complex research university environment.
• Strong executive functioning skills, directing a complex and many-faceted project with diverse partners.
• Problem-solving skills.
• Self-motivated.
• Ability to work independently.
• Attention to detail.
• Organizational skills.
• Ability to prioritize multiple competing priorities.
• Ability to work independently and as part of a team.
• Ability to train and supervise others, including students, volunteers and other support staff.
• Ability to exercise discretion regarding confidential project matters and maintain patient confidentiality.
• Excellent verbal and written communication skills.

Application Documents

• Resume/CV (required)
• Cover Letter (required)

The University of Chicago uses AI-assisted tools to streamline and augment some recruitment processes; however, AI is not used to make hiring decisions.

When applying, the document(s) MUST be uploaded via the My Experience page, in the section titled Application Documents of the application.

Job Family
Administration & Management

Role Impact
People Manager

Scheduled Weekly Hours
40

Drug Test Required
No

Health Screen Required
No

Motor Vehicle Record Inquiry Required
No

Pay Rate Type
Salary

FLSA Status
Exempt

Pay Range
$200,000.00 - $250,000.00
The included pay rate or range represents the University's good faith estimate of the possible compensation offer for this role at the time of posting.

Benefits Eligible
Yes
The University of Chicago offers a wide range of benefits programs and resources for eligible employees, including health, retirement, and paid time off. Information about the benefit offerings can be found in the Benefits Guidebook.