Director, Process Improvement and Readiness

Awarded a Healthiest Employer, Blue Cross Blue Shield of Arizona aims to fulfill its mission to inspire health and make it easy. BCBSAZ offers a variety of health insurance products and services to meet the diverse needs of individuals, families, and small and large businesses as well as providing information and tools to help individuals make better health decisions.

This work opportunity requires residency, and work to be performed, within the State of Arizona.

PURPOSE OF THE JOB

Director, Process Improvement and Readiness: Responsible for leading large-scale enterprise-wide initiatives through the expert deployment of Lean and Six Sigma methodologies which optimize end-to-end operations, create efficiencies, enhance quality and position the organization for profitable growth

by mitigating the need for incremental administrative costs. Specifically, this role will be accountable for managing the Continuous Improvement Managers and Business Readiness Leads who act as the primary point of contact for enterprise-wide initiatives.

QUALIFICATIONS

REQUIRED QUALIFICATIONS

1. Required Work Experience

· 7 years of experience at a health insurance payor

· 5 years of experience in process management and business architecture development

· 5 years of experience in business/systems analysis, technical implementations, and implementing corporate projects

· 3 years of management experience

· 3 years of experience in generating, selecting and implementing solutions to improve process performance.

· 3 years of experience in project management and process improvement

2. Required Education

· College degree or equivalent years of experience

3. Required Licenses

· N/A

4. Required Certifications

· N/A

PREFERRED QUALIFICATIONS

1. Preferred Work Experience

· 10 years of experience at a health insurance payor

· 7 years of experience in process management and business architecture development

· 7 years of experience in business/systems analysis, technical implementations, and implementing corporate projects

· 5 years of management experience

· 5 years of experience in generating, selecting and implementing solutions to improve process performance in a large-

scale health insurance operations area

· 5 years of experience in project management and process improvement

· 3 years of experience in developing short- and long-range strategic plans, forecasting, and budgeting

· 1 - 3 years experience working in an agile environment including planning, stand ups, story points/backlogs,

burndown charts/velocity metrics and retrospectives

2. Preferred Education · Master’s degree in business administration or related field

3. Preferred Licenses

· Lean Six Sigma Black Belt

4. Preferred Certifications

· N/A

ESSENTIAL JOB FUNCTIONS AND RESPONSIBILITIES

PROCESS IMPROVEMENT

· Establish and oversee a highly matrixed organization to align collaboration between the operational functional leaders, GMs, Transformation Office and IT.

· Develops and deploys a business improvement discipline and practice across the organization, adopting practices of Lean and Six Sigma and following the DMAIC approach across all phases.

· Aligns internal resources to projects and manages external sourcing to obtain full competency to complete projects.

· Support department-level and enterprise executives in decision-making, setting strategic goals, and investment priorities that position the organization for digital and automation capabilities and in goal setting activities.

· Hires, trains, coaches, counsels and evaluates performance of direct reports.

· Provide direction to department Continuous Improvement Managers and Six Sigma Black Belts in the business engineering and detailed requirement phase of large corporate initiatives or large process improvement events. Assure that process excellence has been established within the overall planning of the project and assure that requirements are documented in a fashion that the technology staff can design solutions.

· Provide direction to business readiness managers to ensure that all hand-offs between business areas are documented end to end to support training, any organizational change in duties performed and ready to manage new and/or modified duties within the operational area.

· Support the facilitation of a change-ready culture by engaging, partnering and coaching leaders and stakeholders; apply change management processes/tools to create plans that support adoption of changes required by a project or initiative.

· Support organizational design and definition of roles and responsibilities.

· Communicate and coordinate with the business units to ensure a consistent understanding of business case development and building process excellence into the business plans.

· Make recommendations for process improvements as a by-product of business modeling and architecture efforts.

· Manage and refine processes for identifying and prioritizing projects with greatest benefit to the company and to the customers.

METRICS AND METHODS

· Develop metrics and targets that support the organizational strategic vision and objectives. Measure and monitor program effectiveness and efficiency for continuous improvement.

· Communicate metrics, goals, and performance with management and employees.

· Support project teams in the development of metrics and targets for individual projects.

· Drive and participate in the Lean/Six Sigma evolution activities. Align "best-in-class" practice methods with organizational procedures. Drive those improvements into the overall training plan.

· Design and implement business unit and organizational performance systems supported by benchmarking, cost analysis, business cases and other criteria. Promote the use of data analysis in decision making across business functions.

OVERALL

· Oversee day-to-day departmental administration by coaching and motivating managerial staff and departmental personnel to make maximum use of experience and skills.

· Monitor quality performance measures, develop and maintain effective workflows, and seek to maximize system efficiencies.

· Manage use of corporate funds including budgeting, financial management, and reporting. Identify opportunities to achieve administrative efficiencies while maintaining service.

· Maintain effective working relationships to ensure teamwork in achieving corporate goals.

· Participate in strategic planning activities and contribute to departmental and cross-functional teams to achieve BCBSAZ goals and ensure future success.

· Coordinate activities between multiple divisions to achieve desired results.

· Lead and participate in other corporate projects as assigned.

· Support BCBSAZ’s Core Value of maintaining a heritage of service, by volunteering with, serving on, and supporting multiple Boards of Directors within the community.

· The position requires a full-time work schedule. Full-time is defined as working at least 40 hours per week, plus any additional hours as requested or as needed to meet business requirements.

· Perform all other duties as assigned.

COMPETENCIES

REQUIRED COMPETENCIES

2. Required Job Skills

· Proficiency in process improvement and business process design.

· Strong analytical skills. Data analysis, process analysis, root cause analysis and problem solving skills.

· Strong written and verbal communications..

· Strong project management skills.

· Intermediate PC proficiency

· Intermediate skill using departmental BCBSAZ and BCBSA software.

1. Required Professional Competencies · Strong negotiation skills. · Excellent active listening skills. · Ability to identify impact of changes, in order to identify and mitigate risks. · Recognize strategic opportunities and use data to make timely and sound decisions. · Knowledge of how to brainstorm process improvements and assist management with project selection criteria. · Experience in conceptualizing new business architecture and infrastructure. · Knowledge of statistical concepts and capabilities. · Knowledge of principles and methods related to effectively implementing change management. · Flexibility and willingness to adjust to shifting demands/priorities.

· Ability and experience to assimilate multiple new functions, services, projects and systems while maintaining existing systems and programs.

2. Required Leadership Experience and Competencies

· High standard of performance while pursuing aggressive goals

· Principled leadership and sound business ethics

· Demonstrates political awareness and a proven track record of building effective working relationships with senior

level business partners both internally and externally.

· Ability to coordinate with stakeholders across the company and manage occasionally competing interests.

· Ability to work with others collaboratively in a constantly changing environment.

· Ability to motivate and empower associates at all levels and encourages innovation and risk taking.

· Advanced customer relationship management skills

· Leadership and matrix management skills

PREFERRED COMPETENCIES

1. Preferred Job Skills

· Knowledge of current data mining and reporting tools and technologies.

2. Preferred Professional Competencies

· Thorough knowledge of the company’s needs, policies and culture

3. Preferred Leadership Experience and Competencies

· Ability to lead others in the same or higher levels to a valuable solution that may be novel or have no known set

precedence in the operational processes or outsourcing areas.

Our Commitment

BCBSAZ does not discriminate in hiring or employment on the basis of race, ethnicity, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, age, disability, protected veteran status or any other protected group.

Thank you for your interest in Blue Cross Blue Shield of Arizona.  For more information on our company, see azblue.com.  If interested in this position, please apply.