Operations Manager of Survivorship and Palliative Care

Virginia Commonwealth University; Richmond (VA); On-site; USD 120,000 - 147,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Tuition benefits

Paid annual and holiday leave

Retirement planning

Employee discounts

Well-being resources

Career development

Job summary

Virginia Commonwealth University seeks an Operations Manager for Survivorship and Palliative Care to drive administrative and operational leadership across cancer survivorship and outpatient palliative care clinics. The role partners with medical directors, clinicians, nurses, and health-system teams to ensure efficient operations and aligned strategy.

You will lead workflows, scheduling, access, and patient flow, while supporting research-enabled care and grant-funded programs.

Qualifications

• Master’s degree in health administration, healthcare management, public health, business administration, or a closely related field.
• At least seven years of progressively responsible experience in healthcare administration, clinical operations, program management, or a related area.
• Experience supporting outpatient clinical programs in an academic medical center, health system, cancer center, or similarly complex healthcare environment.
• Demonstrated experience with workflow design, program implementation, process improvement, interdisciplinary coordination, and operational problem-solving.
• Experience managing budgets, financial processes, sponsored programs, grants, or multiple funding sources.
• Experience supporting clinical research, quality-improvement initiatives, or grant-funded healthcare programs.

Responsibilities

• Direct the day-to-day administrative and operational activities of the cancer survivorship program and outpatient palliative care clinics.
• Develop, implement, evaluate, and standardize workflows to improve access, efficiency, reliability, and continuity of care.
• Monitor clinic capacity, provider templates, referral pipelines, scheduling, visit volumes, no-shows and cancellations.

Skills

Healthcare administration

Program management

Operations leadership

Process improvement

Education

Master’s degree

equivalent experience

Tools

Budget management

Workflow design

Job description

Benefits: All full-time university staff are eligible for VCU’s robust benefits package that includes comprehensive health benefits, paid annual and holiday leave granted up front, generous tuition benefits, retirement planning and savings options, tax-deferred annuity and cash match programs, employee discounts, well-being resources, abundant opportunities for career development and advancement, and more.

• Continuing education for undergraduate and graduate tuition for a maximum of 6 credits per semester;
• Professional development opportunities encouraged and offered for employees as part of annual career development, e.g. certifications, seminars, courses, annual conferences, mentorship;
• 28 Vacation Days, 12+ State Holidays, and 4 Days to volunteer;
• Medical, Dental and Vision Health Benefits to meet the needs of employees and their eligible family members from the Commonwealth of Virginia as well as optional FSA;
• Participation in the Virginia Retirement System (VRS) and other retirement saving options;
• Parental and Caregiver Leave, Short Term Disability (STD), Disability Insurance, Voluntary Long Term Care Insurance, and Employee Assistance Program.

Unit: Massey Comprehensive Cancer Ctr MBU

Department: Massey Central Admin

Department Summary: Massey Comprehensive Cancer Center
Mission: To reduce the state cancer burden for all Virginians by addressing the confluence between biological, social, and policy drivers through high-impact, cutting-edge research; person-centered care across the continuum, from prevention through survivorship; community integration; and training the next generation of community-centric researchers and healthcare professionals
Vision: To be a premier community-focused cancer center leading the nation in cancer health equity research and ensuring optimal health outcomes for all

Why Richmond?

Duties & Responsibilities:

The Operations Manager of Survivorship and Palliative Care provides administrative and operational leadership for the cancer survivorship program and outpatient palliative care clinics. Working in close partnership with the Medical Director of Supportive Services, cancer service-line leadership, physician and advanced practice leaders, nursing, research teams, and health-system partners, the Director ensures that both programs operate efficiently, consistently, and in alignment with organizational strategy.

The Operations Manager leads efforts to improve access, referral management, scheduling, clinic utilization, staffing coordination, patient flow, documentation processes, financial performance, and the patient and clinician experience. The position also directly supports clinical operations associated with research, demonstration, and grant-funded programs, including the Opioid Abatement Authority-funded clinic, ensuring that clinical workflows and research requirements are integrated safely and effectively.

Essential Responsibilities

Clinical Operations

• Direct the day-to-day administrative and operational activities of the cancer survivorship program and outpatient palliative care clinics.
• Develop, implement, evaluate, and standardize workflows across both programs to improve access, efficiency, reliability, and continuity of care.
• Monitor clinic capacity, provider templates, referral pipelines, scheduling, visit volumes, no-show and cancellation patterns, patient flow, and operational barriers.

• Partner with clinical leaders to align staffing models, space, scheduling, and operational resources with patient demand and program priorities.
• Coordinate resolution of operational issues that cross departmental or health-system boundaries, escalating concerns appropriately and maintaining accountability for follow-through.
• Support effective handoffs and coordination among oncology, primary care, specialty services, social work, pharmacy, behavioral health, rehabilitation, nursing, and community partners.
• Develop and maintain standard operating procedures, process maps, escalation pathways, and operational documentation.

Program Integration

• Serve as the primary administrative liaison between survivorship, outpatient palliative care, the cancer service line, and relevant health-system departments.
• Promote alignment of the two programs while preserving their distinct clinical missions, patient populations, and service requirements.
• Support growth planning, new-service implementation, clinic redesign, and strategic initiatives within supportive cancer care.
• Facilitate interdisciplinary operational meetings; establish agendas, maintain action plans, assign accountability, and monitor completion of agreed-upon work.
• Build effective relationships with clinical departments, ambulatory operations, information technology, finance, human resources, compliance, research administration, and community partners.

Research-Enabled Care

• Directly assist with clinical operations for research, quality-improvement, demonstration, and externally funded programs embedded within survivorship and outpatient palliative care.
• Provide operational leadership for the Opioid Abatement Authority-funded clinic and similar initiatives serving patients with cancer, serious illness, pain, opioid-related risk, or substance-use concerns.
• Collaborate with investigators, research coordinators, clinicians, and administrators to integrate study or program requirements into routine clinic workflows without compromising patient care.

• Support operational readiness for participant identification, referrals, scheduling, documentation, data capture, reporting, and coordination of clinical and research activities.
• Help ensure adherence to institutional policies, human-subject protections, grant requirements, applicable regulations, and approved protocols.
• Coordinate budgets, implementation timelines, deliverables, progress reports, and operational metrics for assigned sponsored programs.

Performance Improvement

• Establish and maintain dashboards and reports for access, volume, throughput, referral conversion, utilization, patient experience, quality, financial performance, and program outcomes.
• Use operational data and frontline feedback to identify variation, bottlenecks, and opportunities for improvement.
• Lead or facilitate process-improvement projects using structured methods and measurable goals.
• Partner with information-technology and analytics teams to improve documentation tools, work queues, data quality, reporting, and clinical decision support.
• Support quality initiatives related to serious-illness care, advance care planning, symptom management, care transitions, and survivorship care delivery.

Financial Management

• Develop and manage operating budgets for assigned programs in partnership with service-line and departmental finance teams.
• Monitor expenditures, revenue, productivity, staffing, sponsored accounts, and variance against budget.
• Support business planning, resource requests, financial projections, and return-on-investment analyses for program growth or redesign.
• Coordinate purchasing, contract, payroll, reconciliation, and sponsored-fund processes within institutional requirements.
• Collaborate with revenue-cycle partners to address registration, authorization, coding, billing, and reimbursement barriers affecting clinic operations.

Personnel Leadership

• Supervise, coach, and develop assigned operational or administrative personnel.
• Clarify roles, performance expectations, accountability, and service standards across the programs.
• Support recruitment, onboarding, training, professional development, and performance-management processes.
• Foster a culture of collaboration, respect, inclusion, patient-centeredness, continuous improvement, and responsible stewardship.

Qualifications:

Minimum Qualifications

• Master’s degree in health administration, healthcare management, public health, business administration, or a closely related field. Equivalent combination of education, experience, and training acceptable.
• At least seven years of progressively responsible experience in healthcare administration, clinical operations, program management, or a related area.
• Experience supporting outpatient clinical programs in an academic medical center, health system, cancer center, or similarly complex healthcare environment.
• Demonstrated experience with workflow design, program implementation, process improvement, interdisciplinary coordination, and operational problem-solving.
• Experience managing budgets, financial processes, sponsored programs, grants, or multiple funding sources.
• Experience supporting clinical research, quality-improvement initiatives, or grant-funded healthcare programs.
• Strong project-management skills, including the ability to manage concurrent priorities, timelines, stakeholders, risks, and deliverables.
• Strong written, verbal, facilitation, and relationship-management skills.
• Demonstrated ability to work effectively with physicians, advanced practice providers, nurses, researchers, administrators, and health-system leaders.
• Proficiency with standard office, project-management, reporting, and healthcare information systems.
• Demonstrated ability to work in and foster an environment of respect, professionalism and civility with a population of faculty, staff, and students from all backgrounds and experiences, or a commitment to do so as a staff member at VCU.

Preferred Qualifications

• Experience in oncology, cancer survivorship, palliative care, serious-illness care, pain management, or substance-use-related clinical programs.
• Experience managing operations for grant-funded or research-enabled outpatient clinics.
• Knowledge of pre-award and post-award grant administration, sponsored-account management, and funder reporting.
• Familiarity with human-subject research requirements and Good Clinical Practice; current CITI human-subject research or GCP training is desirable.
• Experience with ambulatory access, provider-template optimization, revenue-cycle processes, clinical documentation, and electronic health-record workflow improvement.
• Experience supporting continuing education, fellowship programs, Project ECHO, or community-engagement initiatives.
• Evidence of scholarly or quality-improvement collaboration, including presentations, publications, or implementation reports.

Salary Range: Starting at 133,500. Commensurate with experience

VCU is committed to hiring veterans! VCU will include a veteran’s period(s) of military service in the calculation of their annual leave accrual rate. This may provide veterans with an increased leave accrual!

Please let us know if you were referred by a current Massey employee to ensure we honor our commitment to the Employee Referral Program.

Position will remain open until filled. Applications received by October 28th, 2026 will be given priority consideration.

FLSA Exemption Status: Exempt

Hours per Week: 40

Restricted Position: No

ORP Eligible: Yes

Flexible Work Arrangement: Fully onsite

University Job Title: 91991 - Open

Contact Information: [e-mail]

Contact Name: Callie Darling