Chief Medical Officer - Specialty Care

When you join the growing BILH team, you're not just taking a job, you’re making a difference in people’s lives.

Reporting to the President of the BILH Medical Group, the Chief Medical Officer-Specialty Care (CMO-SC) serves as the senior clinical leader for the employed specialty physician and advanced practitioner enterprise within BILH Medical Group Specialty Care (BILHSC). The CMO-SC is accountable for clinical quality, safety, patient experience, workforce engagement, program development, and the operational and financial performance of the BILHSC enterprise.

A defining feature of this role is the breadth and complexity of its external relationships. Within the Community Division, the CMO-SC collaborates closely with the CMOs of all local hospitals — including BID Plymouth, Mount Auburn Hospital, Anna Jaques Hospital, Beverly Hospital, Winchester Hospital, BID-Milton, and BID-Needham — to align specialty program strategy, physician and APP engagement, quality, and clinical standards. Beyond the Community Division, the CMO-SC maintains active relationships with clinical and administrative leadership at BILH’s academic medical centers, specifically BIDMC and Lahey Hospital & Medical Center, as well as Harvard Medical Faculty Physicians (HMFP) and other BILH clinical units. These relationships are essential to coordinating specialty referral networks, managing faculty and employed specialist alignment, and advancing service line development across the integrated system.

The CMO-SC partners closely with the CMO–Primary Care to ensure coordinated care delivery, integrated referral pathways, and a unified physician and APP culture across the Medical Group. The role carries explicit accountability for specialty physician and APP recruitment, retention, and culture, overall quality, compensation design and governance, and business development in collaboration with hospital, academic, and system partners.

Key collaborators include the CMO for Primary Care, the COO of the BILH Medical Group, and the CFO of the BILH Medical Group, while system level partners span Community Division Hospital CMOs, BIDMC and Lahey clinical and departmental leaders, HMFP leadership, the BILH Senior Leadership Team, and the BILH Chief Clinical Officer. The position requires board certification in the relevant specialty along with ongoing licensure and active clinical practice (0.25 cFTE).

Job Description:

Essential Duties & Responsibilities

Clinical Leadership & Quality

• Oversees all aspects of the BILHSC clinical enterprise, establishing performance expectations, developing leadership acumen and delegating authority to specialty care medical directors.
• Ensures high quality (clinical outcomes and patient experience) and risk management standards are upheld across all specialty practices, fostering a high reliability ecosystem.
• Responsible for superior quality, safety, patient experience, and outcomes measurement across all specialty care practices and programs.
• Collaborates with BILH Performance Network and like quality initiatives and governing bodies across the system on various initiatives aimed at optimizing overall care delivery to patients and communities.
• Ensures clinic operations comply with applicable accreditation, statutory, and regulatory requirements including The Joint Commission and the Massachusetts Department of Public Health, where applicable.
• Assesses emerging technologies and clinical innovations that enhance specialty care outcomes; champions evidence-based practice transformation.
• Maintains a minimum of 0.25 clinical FTE, sustaining board certification and active practice in a specialty aligned with BILHSC scope.

Community Division Hospital CMO Collaboration

• Serves as the primary clinical interface between BILH Medical Group Specialty Care and the CMOs of all Community Division hospital entities.
• Partners with local hospital CMOs to align specialty program strategy, credentialing standards, service line growth, and clinical policies across the community network.
• Collaborates with hospital CMOs and service line leadership on coproduction of specialty care programs — including cardiovascular, oncology, orthopedics, surgical services, and women’s health — ensuring coherent market positioning and resource alignment.
• Serves as a physician ambassador in discussions with community hospital leadership regarding specialty physician practice patterns, referral optimization, and care standardization.
• Partners with the COO and community hospital leadership on specialty service line expansion, freestanding ambulatory development, and strategic growth initiatives consistent with Blueprint 2030.

Academic Medical Center, HMFP & Clinical Unit Relationships

• Maintains productive working relationships with clinical chiefs, department chairs, specialty leadership, and key clinical leaders at BIDMC and Lahey Hospital & Medical Center to advance specialty alignment, co-management, and network coordination across the BILH system.
• Partners with HMFP leadership to identify opportunities for clinical collaboration, joint program development, and faculty-employed specialist alignment in shared specialty service areas.
• Works with BILH system-level leadership (SLT) to ensure that BILHSC specialty strategy is coherent with academic program priorities, research missions, and tertiary referral patterns.
• Serves as the Medical Group’s principal relationship manager with specialty clinical unit leadership across BILH entities, navigating complex governance and affiliation dynamics to advance integrated care delivery.
• Participates actively in BILH system-level leadership forums, clinical governance structures, and cross-entity planning processes to represent specialty care interests.
• Identifies opportunities for BILHSC specialists to collaborate with academic department faculty on quality, education, and clinical program development, strengthening recruitment pipelines and professional engagement.
• Collaborates with BILH Performance Network on quality and contract performance as it aligns with care delivery through specialty care practice.

Physician and APP Recruitment, Retention & Workforce Development

• Leads physician and APP recruitment strategy for BILHSC, partnering with HR and physician recruiters to develop compelling specialty care value propositions that attract high-caliber candidates.
• Designs and implements retention programs tailored to specialty physician needs, including practice environment, workload balance, leadership opportunity, and professional development pathways.
• Oversees onboarding and integration of new specialty physicians and APPs to accelerate time-to-productivity and long-term engagement.
• Fosters physician and APP leadership development and succession planning across specialty divisions; cultivates an environment of learning, feedback, and career growth.
• Partners with medical directors on individual performance management, career development planning, and early intervention when performance concerns arise.
• Champions a culture of belonging, psychological safety, and caregiver resilience within BILHSC.

Physician Compensation & Business Development

• Partners with the President, CFO, and COO to develop, maintain, and govern specialty physician and APP compensation plans, ensuring market competitiveness, internal equity, and regulatory compliance.
• Brings direct expertise in wRVU-based productivity compensation, base salary benchmarking (MGMA, AMGA, SullivanCotter), quality incentive design, and call coverage compensation.
• Evaluates and advises on specialty-specific compensation structures including tiered productivity models, elective and cash-pay carve-outs, co-management arrangements, and leadership stipends.
• Partners with hospital CMOs, service line leaders, academic partners, and the COO on business development opportunities including new specialty programs, ambulatory site expansion, joint ventures, and co-management agreements.
• Contributes clinical and operational credibility to business cases, proformas, and ROI analyses supporting specialty program growth investments.
• Supports strategic alignment of non-employed and private practice specialists to BILH through clinical integration, co-management, and network affiliation strategies.

Operations, Strategy & Financial Management

• Partners as a key member of the BILH Medical Group executive leadership team, contributing clinical and strategic expertise to enterprise-wide initiatives.
• In partnership with the President, COO, and CFO, oversees the BILHSC budget process including volume, revenue, and expense planning; develops action plans to address variances.
• Contributes expertise in specialty practice operations to decisions about space utilization, staffing models, scheduling optimization, and resource allocation.
• Ensures timely specialty care access; drives lead time reduction and referral pathway optimization in collaboration with primary care and hospital partners.
• Oversees population health and value-based care performance for specialty care, collaborating with BILH Performance Network and population health leadership.

Physician Enterprise & Integration

• Partners with the CMO – Primary Care to ensure coordinated physician engagement, integrated care delivery standards, and joint strategy across the Medical Group.
• Directly responsible for Regional Specialty Care Medical Directors (as applicable) and their oversight of practice-level medical directors.
• Interfaces with system and entity CMOs, hospital leadership, and specialists to ensure outstanding specialty care delivery across the enterprise.
• Represents BILH Medical Group Specialty Care to external organizations, agencies, and partners as needed.
• Participates in relevant BILH Physician Enterprise governance and advisory meetings.

Key Requirements

• M.D. or D.O. with current licensure in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts
• Board certification in a specialty aligned with BILHSC clinical scope; active clinical practice required (0.25 cFTE)
• Minimum of 7-10 years of actual practice experience
• 5–7 years of significant senior clinical leadership responsibility in a complex, matrixed health system or large specialty group practice
• Demonstrated experience working across community hospital and academic medical center boundaries; prior collaboration with hospital CMOs, academic department chairs, and faculty group leadership strongly preferred
• Familiarity with various physician employment models, faculty physician group dynamics, and academic-community specialty alignment models an asset
• Direct experience with specialty physician compensation plan design and administration, including wRVU productivity models and MGMA/AMGA benchmarking
• Experience leading specialty physician and APP recruitment, onboarding, and retention programs
• Track record of physician-led business development and service line growth in an employed or integrated network environment
• Nuanced understanding of ambulatory specialty operations in a geographically distributed network
• Advanced leadership training and/or MBA an asset
• Content expertise in quality, safety, patient experience, clinical transformation, population health, and value-based contracts a must

Key Leadership Capabilities

• Exceptional relationship-building skills with hospital executives, CMOs, academic physician leaders, and faculty practice leadership across complex, matrixed organizations
• Strong leadership, communication, listening, collaborative, and organizational skills with outstanding personal integrity
• Ability to foster organizational trust and provider followership through empathy and relationship building
• Charismatic leader with strength of presence, conviction, strong influencing and negotiation skills; able to manage complex and shifting organizational dynamics
• Strength in both operations and strategy with the ability to delegate yet execute while holding teams and individuals accountable
• Business acumen with direct experience in financial management, proforma development, and specialty program ROI evaluation
• Disciplined and creative thinker with the ability to craft and execute a vision which others will follow
• Executive presence; ability to represent BILH Medical Group credibly in system-level and external forums
• Ability to mentor and develop others and to build highly functional, geographically distributed teams
• Emotional intelligence and organizational emotional intelligence
• Commitment to fostering diversity, Just Culture, and servant leadership philosophy
• Demonstrated ability to lead and successfully execute complex organizational initiatives

Pay Range:

$300,000.00 USD - $337,500.00 USD

The pay range listed for this position is the annual base salary range the organization reasonably and in good faith expects to pay for this position at this time. Actual compensation may be determined based on several factors, that may include education, training, relevant experience, specialty, geography of work location, productivity, job responsibilities, or other applicable factors permissible by law.  In addition to base compensation, this position may be eligible for performance-based incentive compensation, which may include productivity and quality bonuses. 

As a health care organization, we have a responsibility to do everything in our power to care for and protect our patients, our colleagues and our communities. Beth Israel Lahey Health requires that all staff be vaccinated against influenza (flu) as a condition of employment.

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