Founding Clinical Director - Southern California (San Diego)

FronteraCare; San Diego (CA); On-site; USD 130,000 - 160,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Health benefits

401(k) plan

PTO

Job summary

FronteraCare is seeking a Founding Clinical Director for Southern California (San Diego). Based in San Diego, CA, you will lead the clinical transition from the founder, retain the current team and client base, and drive the growth of FronteraCare in the region.

You will oversee high-quality, evidence-based ABA care, develop BCBAs and RBTs, and partner with operations, growth, and technology teams to scale care and elevate outcomes for children and families.

Qualifications

• Current BCBA certification in good standing with the BACB.
• Master’s degree in Applied Behavior Analysis, Psychology, Education, or a related field.
• Significant experience delivering ABA services, ideally 5+ years post-certification.
• Experience supervising BCBAs and RBTs.
• Experience with Regional Center Early Start referrals is a plus.

Responsibilities

• Lead the clinical transition with the founder and leadership to ensure a smooth handover.
• Establish credibility and trust with existing BCBAs, RBTs, families, and partners.
• Maintain high clinical quality, documentation, and data standards across the market.
• Build and scale the Southern California market, partnerships, and service delivery.
• Champion technology-enabled care and integrate new tools into clinical workflows.

Skills

BCBA certification

Leadership & team development

ABA service delivery

Education

Master’s degree (ABA/related)

Job description

Founding Clinical Director - Southern California (San Diego)

California

FronteraCare delivers life-changing autism services to children and families across New Mexico and Colorado. We provide high quality diagnostic evaluations and ABA therapy, partnering closely with parents, grandparents, foster parents, and other caregivers to create individualized care plans rooted in each child's unique strengths, needs, and family context.

Our clinicians are committed to evidence-based, compassionate care that helps children with autism thrive. We believe the best outcomes are when families are at the heart of the treatment. By combining clinical expertise with family insights, we help children build skills, gain confidence, and thrive.

Our MissionOur mission is to expand access to exceptional diagnostic and behavioral healthcare for every child, no matter where they live or their circumstances.

About the Role

FronteraCare is expanding into Southern California through the acquisition of an established ABA practice in San Diego. We’re looking for an exceptional BCBA leader to take the clinical reins from the practice’s founder and help build the next chapter of the organization.

This is not a traditional Clinical Director role. You’ll inherit an existing team, client base, and community presence, with responsibility for maintaining the trust and clinical quality that have made the practice successful. At the same time, you’ll have the opportunity to build: growing the team, strengthening how we operate, expanding our presence in Southern California, and helping define what technology-enabled ABA care can look like at scale.

We’re looking for someone who can balance both sides of that mandate: a deeply credible clinician and people leader who can earn the trust of an established team, while also being energized by change, growth, technology, and the opportunity to build something better.

You’ll serve as the senior clinical leader for the San Diego market and partner closely with FronteraCare’s clinical, operational, People, Growth, and technology teams.

What You’ll Do

Lead the Clinical Transition

• Partner closely with the current founder and FronteraCare leadership to ensure a thoughtful transition of clinical leadership, team relationships, families, and community partnerships.
• Establish credibility and trust quickly with existing BCBAs, RBTs, families, and partners while preserving the strengths and culture of the existing practice.
• Provide continuity through the transition while identifying opportunities to strengthen clinical quality, team development, and operations.
• Serve as the senior clinical decision-maker for the market and the escalation point for complex clinical situations.

Build and Lead an Exceptional Clinical Team

• Lead, coach, and develop BCBAs, student analysts, RBTs, and future clinical leaders.
• Create a culture where people have clear expectations, receive direct and useful feedback, and have meaningful opportunities to grow.
• Retain and engage the existing clinical team while continuing to recruit and develop the talent needed to grow the market.
• Build leadership depth over time by identifying and developing future Lead BCBAs and other clinical leaders.
• Partner closely with our Talent and People teams on workforce planning, recruiting, onboarding, performance management, and retention.
• Build an environment where high clinical standards and a strong employee experience reinforce one another.

Own Clinical Quality

• Ensure consistently high-quality, ethical, evidence-based ABA care across the market.
• Oversee assessments, treatment planning, behavior intervention plans, case supervision, parent training, and discharge planning.
• Provide consultation and leadership on complex cases, behavioral emergencies, and challenging family situations.
• Establish clear expectations around clinical documentation, treatment fidelity, data quality, utilization, continuity of care, and outcomes.
• Conduct clinical reviews and quality assurance activities and translate findings into coaching, development, and operational improvements.
• Maintain compliance with BACB standards, payer requirements, HIPAA, and applicable California regulations.

Build the Southern California Market

• Partner with Operations and Growth leadership to build San Diego into a strong and scalable FronteraCare market.
• Establish the clinical capacity needed to support growth, including workforce planning, caseload development, and service expansion.
• Build strong relationships with families, schools, pediatricians, referral partners, and the broader autism community.
• Support the development of new community partnerships and referral channels.
• Help shape where and how FronteraCare expands beyond the initial San Diego operation as our Southern California presence grows.
• Bring a builder mindset: identify gaps, solve problems at the source, and create systems and practices that can scale.

Champion Technology-Enabled Care

Frontera builds technology directly alongside the clinicians who use it. As our senior clinical leader in Southern California, you’ll play an important role in making that model work in practice.

• Be an enthusiastic and credible champion of Frontera’s clinical technology with BCBAs and RBTs.
• Drive consistent adoption of Frontera’s assessment, documentation, data, and clinical workflow tools across the market.
• Help clinicians understand not just how to use new tools, but how technology can improve clinical quality, reduce administrative burden, and allow them to spend more time with clients and families.
• Spend time actively using new products and workflows alongside the clinical team and provide candid, practical feedback to our Product and Engineering teams.
• Help distinguish true clinical or operational barriers from normal resistance to change and thoughtfully lead the team through both.
• Serve as a bridge between frontline clinical practice and Frontera’s technology organization, helping ensure what we build reflects the realities of care delivery.

What Success Looks Like

In your first year, you will have:

• Led a smooth transition from the founding clinician, with strong retention of clinicians, families, and key community relationships.
• Established yourself as a trusted and credible leader with the existing clinical team.
• Maintained strong clinical quality and continuity of care through the transition and growth of the market.
• Built consistent coaching, feedback, and development practices for BCBAs and RBTs.
• Grown the San Diego clinical team with the talent needed to meet client demand.
• Integrated Frontera’s technology deeply into day-to-day clinical workflows, with strong adoption and useful feedback flowing back to our Product and Engineering teams.
• Established stronger operating rhythms, clearer accountability, and greater leadership depth across the market.
• Built the clinical and operational foundation for FronteraCare to expand meaningfully across Southern California.

What We’re Looking For

• Current BCBA certification in good standing with the BACB.
• Master’s degree in Applied Behavior Analysis, Psychology, Education, or a related field.
• Significant experience delivering ABA services, ideally 5+ years post-certification.
• Meaningful experience leading and developing BCBAs and RBT teams, ideally as a Clinical Director, Regional Clinical Leader, Lead BCBA, or similar.
• Strong clinical judgment and the credibility to coach experienced clinicians and navigate complex cases.
• Demonstrated success developing, engaging, and retaining clinical teams.
• Experience supervising early intervention programs.
• Experience with Regional Center Early Start referrals strongly preferred, including managing the age-three transition from Regional Center funding to insurance-funded ABA.
• Experience helping grow an ABA clinic, region, or service line strongly preferred.
• Comfort operating in an entrepreneurial environment where not every process has already been built.
• Strong change-management instincts and the ability to bring people along through organizational and technology change.
• Genuine enthusiasm for using technology to improve clinical care—not simply treating technology adoption as an administrative requirement.
• Strong interpersonal skills and the ability to build trust with clinicians, families, community partners, and cross-functional leaders.
• A low-ego, highly collaborative leadership style combined with the ability to make decisions, give direct feedback, and hold a high bar.
• Existing knowledge of the Southern California ABA market is highly valuable.
• Experience developing relationships with schools, referral partners, payers, or community organizations is a plus.

Location

This is an in-market leadership role based in San Diego, California. This leader will spend significant time with clinicians, families, and community partners and should expect to be physically present with the team regularly.

The role will also collaborate closely with FronteraCare leadership and Frontera Health’s Product and Engineering teams.

We have determined a salary range for this position that takes into account several factors including experience, knowledge, education, skills, and abilities. Please note that the salary information is a general guideline and the exact salary will be determined based on the individual’s qualifications and experience, with consideration given to the factors listed above. All full-time employee benefits include health benefits, 401(k) plan, and PTO per year.

Compensation

$130,000 - $160,000 USD

Why Join Us

At Frontera Care, you will be part of a mission-driven, supportive team making a real difference for children and families. We provide the tools, resources, collaboration you need to focus on what matters most: delivering high-quality, family-centered care. If you are passionate about helping children with autism, and want to grow your career while transforming access to care, accessible healthcare, we would love to welcome you to our team.