Job Posting Title Head of Emerging & Digital Therapeutics

LifeStance Health; Chicago (IL); On-site; USD 190,000 - 236,000; Full time

Job summary

LifeStance Health is seeking a Director to identify, evaluate, and responsibly scale emerging therapeutics across pharmacotherapies, neuromodulation, digital therapeutics, and AI-enabled tools. You will partner with multiple departments to ensure governance, safety, and measurable outcomes before implementation.

The role requires 7+ years of leadership in behavioral health or digital health, strong executive communication, and the ability to drive cross-functional initiatives within a

Qualifications

• Master’s/doctoral/medical degree or equivalent in behavioral health, healthcare, clinical innovation, digital health, public health, health administration or related field.
• 7+ years of leadership experience in behavioral healthcare, healthcare innovation, digital health, product-enabled care delivery, clinical transformation, or related settings.
• Experience with digital therapeutics, including knowledge of FDA-cleared PDTs and evidence-based digital health interventions.
• Excellent written, verbal, and executive-level communication skills with ability to translate clinical concepts for operational audiences.

Responsibilities

• Develop and oversee the enterprise roadmap for emerging therapeutic approaches across pharmacotherapies, neuromodulation, digital therapeutics, AI-enabled tools, and other innovations.
• Evaluate and govern emerging therapeutic interventions using evidence strength, safety, regulatory requirements, clinical fit, and operational feasibility.
• Lead clinical integration planning with technology, data, clinical operations, quality, psychiatry, research, and medical leadership teams.
• Partner with growth and other enterprise teams to evaluate scalability of emerging therapeutics within LifeStance’s strategy.
• Create clinical protocols, workflows, adoption materials, and learning resources to implement programs safely and effectively.
• Monitor regulatory, clinical, scientific, and market landscapes to translate implications for operations and enterprise strategy.
• Establish governance criteria for evaluating risk, safety, privacy, compliance, training, and readiness before implementation.
• Serve as a subject matter expert on emerging therapeutic trends, vendor capabilities, clinical innovation, and treatment models.
• Collaborate on data collection, outcomes measurement, safety monitoring, and implementation frameworks for programs.
• Assist the organization in using AI tools, EHR optimization, and clinical data to improve care delivery and provider efficiency.
• Foster research, evidence generation, and partnerships with academia and industry to advance emergent therapeutics.
• Build internal clinical literacy through education, training, and provider adoption support.
• Represent LifeStance as a thought leader in emerging therapeutic innovation across modalities.

Skills

Leadership experience

Executive communication

Emotional intelligence

Judgment

Collaboration

Education

Master’s/doctoral/medical degree or equivalent in related field

Job description

At LifeStance Health, we believe in a truly healthy society where mental and physical healthcare are unified to make lives better. Our mission is to help people lead healthier, more fulfilling lives by improving access to trusted, affordable, and personalized mental healthcare. Everywhere. Every day. It’s a lofty goal; we know. But we make it happen with the best team in behavioral health.

Thank you for taking the time to explore a career with us. As the fastest growing behavioral health practice group in the country, now is the perfect time to join our clinical team!

Role Overview

This is a newly created role responsible for helping LifeStance identify, evaluate, and responsibly scale emerging therapeutic approaches that can improve clinical outcomes and advance the field of mental health. The Director will support a broad enterprise portfolio that may include novel pharmacotherapies, neuromodulation approaches, digital therapeutics, AI-enabled clinical tools, technology-enabled care models, and other innovative treatment modalities. This role will serve as a clinical and strategic partner across the organization by assessing evidence, safety, regulatory considerations, workflow impact, clinical operational feasibility, and measurable outcomes before implementation. The Director will also partner with multiple departments to ensure emerging therapeutics are introduced through strong clinical governance, data-driven quality improvement, provider enablement, responsible innovation, and identification of the learning and development needs required to implement new interventions effectively.

This role is part of a team who will be assisting with implementing the and guiding the directives of the CMO team. We are seeking a highly collaborative, mission-driven professional with strong emotional intelligence, sound judgment, and exceptional executive functioning. The ideal candidate is a mature and efficient team player who communicates thoughtfully, remains solutions-oriented under pressure, and consistently puts shared goals above personal agenda. This person should be energized by the opportunity to help shape the future of mental healthcare and thrive in a high-accountability environment built on trust, focus, and mutual respect.

Consistent with LifeStance’s values, every member of the LifeStance team is expected to support each other and the mission, which may mean participating in projects and initiatives and performing functions and responsibilities not specifically outlined in this job description.

KEY RESPONSIBILITIES

• Develop and maintain the enterprise roadmap for emerging therapeutic approaches, including novel pharmacotherapies, neuromodulation modalities, digital therapeutics, AI-enabled clinical tools, technology-enabled care models, and other innovative interventions.
• Evaluate, recommend, and support governance for emerging therapeutic interventions using evidence strength, safety profile, regulatory requirements, clinical fit, operational feasibility, equity, and patient need.
• Lead clinical integration planning for new therapeutic modalities in collaboration with technology, data, clinical operations, quality, psychiatry, research, learning and development, and medical leadership teams.
• Partner closely with the growth team to evaluate emerging therapeutics, including the clinical and operational scalability to fit into the growth and clinical strategy of LifeStance. This role will also work with Technology, Clinical Operations, Quality, Research, Psychiatry, Clinical Excellence, Learning & Development, and other enterprise teams to integrate new therapeutic capabilities into existing workflows and care models.
• Develop clinical protocols, workflows, provider enablement materials, adoption supports, and learning and development recommendations required to implement emerging therapeutic programs safely and effectively.
• Monitor the regulatory, clinical, scientific, and market landscape for emerging therapeutics and translate implications for clinical operations, governance, implementation planning, and enterprise strategy.
• Establish governance criteria for evaluating clinical risk, patient safety, privacy, compliance, ethics, evidence strength, training requirements, workflow impact, and operational readiness before implementation.
• Serve as a subject matter expert and strategic advisor on emerging therapeutic trends, vendor and partner capabilities, clinical innovation, and responsible behavioral health treatment models.
• Collaborate with clinical leaders on data collection, outcomes measurement, safety monitoring, and implementation frameworks for emerging and interventional therapeutic programs.
• Assist the organization in using AI tools, EHR optimization, clinical data, and other innovation enablers to improve care delivery, quality initiatives, provider efficiency, and patient outcomes.
• Foster clinical research, evidence-generation, and implementation partnerships with academic institutions, health technology companies, pharmaceutical organizations, specialty treatment centers, and other external innovators.
• Build internal clinical literacy around emerging therapeutics through education, training, change management, implementation guidance, and provider adoption supports.
• Represent LifeStance as a thought leader in emerging therapeutic innovation, including pharmaceutical, neuromodulation, digital, AI-enabled, and other advanced mental health treatment models.

Scope / Decision-Making / Impact

This role receives strategic direction from the Senior Leader, Psychiatric Excellence & Emerging Therapeutics and independently leads evaluation, prioritization, and implementation planning for emerging therapeutic opportunities across pharmaceutical, neuromodulation, digital, AI-enabled, and other innovative modalities. The role makes day-to-day decisions regarding evidence review, pilot design, vendor or partner evaluation input, workflow recommendations, governance criteria, and outcome measurement. Input or escalation is required when decisions involve enterprise resource commitments, legal or regulatory considerations, privacy/security risk, patient safety concerns, new medical interventions, or significant operational impact.

Supervisory Responsibilities

This role may not initially have direct reports but is expected to lead matrixed, cross-functional implementation teams and provide clinical guidance to project teams, vendors, and operational partners. Future direct reports or contractors may be added as the portfolio scales. The role influences performance through program leadership, clinical standards, training, adoption support, and accountability for measurable outcomes.

Requirements

• Master’s degree, doctoral degree, medical degree, or equivalent experience in behavioral health, healthcare, clinical innovation, digital health, public health, health administration, or a related field.
• 7+ years of leadership experience in behavioral healthcare, healthcare innovation, digital health, product-enabled care delivery, clinical transformation, or related healthcare settings.
• Demonstrated experience with digital therapeutics, including knowledge of FDA-cleared PDTs and evidence-based digital health interventions
• Experience evaluating or implementing technology-enabled clinical programs or innovative care delivery models.
• Demonstrated ability to lead complex cross-functional initiatives from concept through implementation and measurement.
• Strong understanding of evidence-based care, clinical treatment, patient safety, privacy, compliance, and operational implementation considerations.
• Excellent written, verbal, and executive-level communication skills, including the ability to translate clinical concepts for operational and technical audiences.
• Qualified candidates must be legally authorized to be employed in the United States
• LifeStance is an EEO/Affirmative Action Employer and does not discriminate on the basis of age, race, color, religion, gender, sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression, national origin, protected veteran status, disability, or any other legally protected status.
• Demonstrates awareness, inclusivity, sensitivity, humility, and experience in working with individuals from diverse ethnic backgrounds, socioeconomic statuses, sexual orientations, gender identities, and other various aspects of culture.

Preferred Skills And Knowledge

• Experience with digital therapeutics, AI-enabled healthcare solutions, virtual care platforms, remote monitoring, or behavioral health technology.
• Experience in large multi-site, multi-state, or enterprise healthcare organizations.
• Research, publication, outcomes evaluation, or quality improvement experience.
• Experience participating in vendor evaluation, implementation governance, or clinical technology adoption.
• Published research in AI, digital health, or computational psychiatry
• Experience with machine learning platforms, natural language processing in clinical settings, or clinical decision support systems
• Background in or strong familiarity with neuromodulation or interventional psychiatry

Physical Requirements

• The physical demands described here are representative of those that must be met by an employee to successfully perform the essential functions of the job. Reasonable accommodation may be made to enable individuals with disabilities to perform the essential functions.
• While performing the duties of this job, the employee is regularly required to sit, stand, bend, talk and hear. The employee is frequently required to walk. The employee must be able to lift and/or move objects up to 25 pounds. Specific vision abilities required by this job include close vision, distance vision, color vision, peripheral vision, depth perception and the ability to adjust focus.

COMPENSATION:

$190,000 - $236,000/annually in addition to a competitive bonus plan and equity potential.

LifeStance provides the compensation range and benefits that it in good faith believes it might pay and/or offer for this position. LifeStance reserves the right to ultimately pay more or less than the posted range and offer additional benefits and other compensation, depending on circumstances not related to an applicant’s sex or other status protected by local, state, or federal law.

About LifeStance Health

LifeStance is a national provider of mental healthcare services focused on evidenced-based, medically driven treatment services for children, adolescents and adults suffering from a variety of mental health issues in an outpatient care setting, both in-person at its clinics nationwide and through its digital health telemedicine offering. The company employs psychiatrists, psychologists, psychiatric nurse practitioners, and licensed therapists throughout the US.

LifeStance Health is an equal opportunity employer. We celebrate diversity and are fully committed to creating an inclusive work environment for all our employees.

Our values:

Belonging: We cultivate a space where everyone can show up as their authentic self.

Empathy: We seek out diverse perspectives and listen to learn without judgment.

Courage: We are all accountable for doing the right thing - even when it's hard - because we know it's worth it.

One Team: We realize our full potential when we work together towards our shared purpose.

If you elect to interact with us via our website, please only use www.lifestance.com or www.careers.lifestance.com. Additionally, our recruiters utilize email addresses with the @lifestance.com domain. Other websites and domains are not affiliated with LifeStance Health and may represent threats to your data security.

LifeStance Health complies with federal and state disability laws and makes reasonable accommodations for applicants and employees with disabilities. If reasonable accommodation is needed to participate in the job application or interview process, to perform essential job functions, and/or to receive other benefits and privileges of employment, please contact our Human Resources Team at [e-mail] or by calling [phone]. Please note: This contact is intended solely for accommodation requests. Inquiries regarding applications, resumes and applicant status should not be sent to this email address as they will not be reviewed or responded to.