Director Revenue Cycle Automation & Surveillance

Job Description

Reporting to the Associate Vice President of Revenue Cycle Automation, Analytics, & AI, this director will lead teams which utilize Automation, AI, process improvement methodology, & data analysis to surveil revenue cycle key metrics, identify opportunities for improvement, and optimize production work to be increasingly efficient and effective.

This is an exceptional opportunity for a leader with deep central billing experience to drive transformational change across Henry Ford Health's revenue cycle operations. You'll leverage your hands-on understanding of billing workflows, denial management, and operational challenges to architect and deploy cutting-edge automation and AI solutions that enhance financial performance, operational efficiency, and patient experience while supporting value-based care initiatives.

The Director is responsible for building and scaling HFH's automation, AI, and surveillance capabilities across the end-to-end revenue cycle—with a focus on improving financial performance, increasing operational efficiency, improving patient experience, and supporting value-based care goals.

The Director will collaborate closely with leaders across Revenue Cycle, IT, Digital Enablement Hub (DEH), Analytics, Transformation Consulting, and other areas to solve problems & design solutions.

This role will lead teams consisting of managers & consultative staff to achieve set goals.

PRINCIPLE DUTIES AND RESPONSIBILITIES:

Automation & AI Strategy Deployment:

1. Develop in partnership with revenue cycle leaders, a comprehensive automation & AI strategy that aligns with revenue cycle & enterprise priorities.
2. Translate strategies into tactics with defined objectives, scope, resources, & timing.
3. Partner with cross-functional stakeholders in Revenue Cycle, IT, Transformation Consulting, clinical operations, Finance, Compliance, & other areas across the organization to explore, design & execute solutions that achieve goals.
4. Lead the development & implementation of revenue cycle's automation & AI strategy, including:
   • Surveillance of current & emerging technologies that could improve revenue cycle performance.
   • Participation in Epic revenue cycle forums & collaboration with Epic's revenue cycle product experts to understand Epic's upcoming automation & AI features.
   • Creation & maintenance of revenue cycle's multi-year automation & AI roadmap.
   • Collaboration with revenue cycle operational leaders & teams to identify use cases that contribute to achieving goals.
   • Assessment of Epic & other vendor technology (current & roadmap).
   • Assessment of automation & AI use cases to determine value, complexity, effort; determine if use cases should proceed & best solution pathway.
   • Partnership with IT & DEH to design, build, test, deploy, & monitor custom automations.
   • Partnership with IT & DEH, RC Leaders, & other RC consultative resources to configure & deploy Epic & vendor automation & AI features.
   • Partnership with revenue cycle operations to ensure deployed automations are achieving anticipated goals; assist operations with change management that is often required when utilizing new technology.
   • Measurement of automation & AI impact.
   • Collaboration with DEH to continually align on revenue cycle automation & AI strategies, use cases, & results.
5. Serve as a thought leader and internal advocate, communicating the strategic potential of automation & AI across revenue cycle and ensuring alignment with Henry Ford Health's digital transformation agenda.

Process Standardization & Optimization:

1. Responsible for the design and continuous evaluation of functions and workflows, to organize work based on production action, to achieve optimal efficiency.
2. Collaborate with leaders & team members across RC to identify opportunities for process improvement and implement changes.
3. Responsible for coordination with IT leaders & team members to identify, design, test, implement, and monitor changes to the Epic HB and PB systems.
4. Maintain & optimize performance management tools which provide operational leaders insight into productivity and quality performance trends.

Surveillance & Prevention:

1. Develop, orchestrate, & maintain, in partnership with revenue cycle leaders, a surveillance program that minimizes revenue cycle risk & identifies opportunities for improvement. This program will include the following:
   • Develop & maintain clear documentation of revenue cycle's matrixed approach for surveillance; this will allow revenue cycle team members & leaders to always see what is being surveilled, who is participating in the surveillance, & the cadence for surveillance.
   • Collaborate with operational leaders to determine which metrics should be regularly surveilled; this will include both leading indicator & outcome metrics.
   • Track the performance of key revenue cycle metrics over time.
   • Identify variance to baseline &/or expected performance.
   • Perform &/or coordinate the investigation & root cause analysis of negative trends, issues, or outliers.
   • Partner with operational & consultative team members & leaders to identify the action(s) needed to improve performance.
   • Communicate surveillance results & findings as appropriate to revenue cycle leaders & team member.
2. Responsible for creating departmental and cross-functional workgroups to implement initiatives to reduce denials and other errors. This includes coordination with other HFH business units, revenue cycle teams, hospital departments, physician practices, and other teams across the organization.
3. Create and lead a denial management infrastructure with constant focus on identifying root causes and developing prevention initiatives.
4. Maximize use of Epic reporting & benchmarking capabilities (e.g., Epic Pulse)
5. Partner with the revenue cycle analytics team to develop & optimize analytical tools that make the surveillance program more efficient & effective.
6. Utilize AI & other analytical technology to supplement human surveillance activities.

General:

1. Network with peers & communities across the industry to stay abreast of new technology capabilities & use cases & to collaborate on areas of mutual interest.

Qualifications

EDUCATION/EXPERIENCE REQUIRED: 

• Bachelor’s Degree is required, preferably in Healthcare Administration, Business, Computer Science, Analytics, Data Science, or a related field.
• Master’s Degree preferred. 
• Seven (7) years of relevant experience, with specific emphasis in revenue cycle, process improvement, analytics, technology deployment, strategy development, & project management. 
• Demonstrated success leading large innovation initiatives. 
• Minimum of five (5) years managing professionals. 
• Demonstrated understanding of artificial intelligence, automation, data applications and technologies. 
• Knowledge of best practices related to revenue cycle operations. 
• Experience at a large, complex, integrated healthcare organization preferred. 
• Superior ability to influence at all levels in an organization and advocate for the use of automation & AI as an asset to drive organizational strategy.

Additional Information