Regional Director of Nursing Professional Practice, Research, and Innovation

The Regional Director of Nursing Professional Practice, Research, and Innovation is a clinical nurse specialist who provides strategic leadership for nursing professional practice, professional governance, research, evidence-based practice, clinical inquiry and innovation across Kaiser Permanente Northwest - Oregon and SW Washington (2 Hospitals, Ambulatory, Ambulatory Surgery Centers, Care Continuum, Regional Advice Nurse Services, and Dentistry). This role partners with nursing and patient care services, operational, and interdisciplinary leaders to advance nursing excellence, improve patient and workforce outcomes, and foster a culture of inquiry, innovation, and continuous improvement. The Regional Director oversees initiatives that strengthen professional practice, support scholarly activity, drive innovation in care delivery, and advance Magnet standards, designation, and re-designation across the continuum of care. This role is responsible for building the structure, process, and people, (future Clinical Nurse Specialist Team), for the Professional Practice of Nursing in partnership with Nursing Professional Development.

In addition to the responsibilities listed below, this position is also responsible for defining the scope and standards of practice for RNs, LVNs, and other health professionals; leveraging data insights to drive ongoing quality improvement programs to ensure the implementation and adoption of clinical best practices and evidence-based practices across the organization (e.g., hospitals, in-patient, 24/7, out-patient, home health, continuing care) to include operational responsibilities; leveraging evidence-based research to drive long-term policy and procedure development; anticipating and mitigating regulatory risks; advising administrators, senior leaders, physicians, and staff on the interpretation of applicable regulatory requirements; developing strategies, programs, and improvement opportunities to oversee multidisciplinary teams in clinical education, patient safety, and risk management initiatives; and providing expert consultation to the departments to support positive change and drive clinical best practices; building strategic relationships with key senior leaders to support 24/7 care delivery and align care delivery initiatives; and reviewing, analyzing, and establishing clinical workflows by evaluating current practices and develops improvement plans as appropriate. May include operational responsibilities.

• Builds organizational capacity and prepares high potentials for growth opportunities and advancement; builds collaborative networks inside and outside the organization for self and others. Provides framework for soliciting and acting on performance feedback; drives collaboration to set goals and provide open feedback and coaching to foster performance improvement. Models and drives continuous learning and oversees the recruitment, selection, and development of talent; stays current with industry trends, benchmarks, and best practices; ensures performance management guidelines and expectations to achieve business needs. Acts as a thought leader on industry trends, benchmarks, and best practices; shares best practices within and across teams to drive improvement. Motivates and empowers teams; maintains a highly skilled and engaged workforce by aligning cross-functional resource plans with business objectives. Provides guidance when difficult decisions need to be made; creates opportunities for expanded scope of decision making and impact across teams.
• Oversees the operation of multiple units and/or departments by identifying member and operational needs; ensures the management of work assignment allocation and completion; translates business strategy into actionable business requirements; ensures products and/or services meet member requirements and expectations while aligning with organizational strategies. Engages strategic, cross-functional business units to champion and drive support for business plans and priorities; assumes responsibility for decision making; sets standards, measures progress, and ensures resolution of escalated issues. Sets and communicates goals and objectives; analyzes resources, costs, and forecasts and incorporates them into business plans; obtains and distributes resources. Anticipates and removes obstacles that impact performance; addresses performance gaps and implements contingency plans accordingly; ensures teams accomplish business objectives; serves as a subject-matter expert and trusted source to executive leadership; provides influence and consultation in the development of the larger organizational or business strategy.
• Directs ambulatory operations to support patient care by: anticipating business issues and barriers and providing recommendations and overseeing the development of strategy with stakeholders to identify factors contributing to business value; aligning workflow and performance targets across departments and across KP and accountable for department performance targets and aligning with market strategies; optimizing and prioritizing operational initiatives and strategies related to departmental or program goals, objectives, and/or outcomes; partnering with internal and external stakeholders to identify areas of improvement and alleviate potential barriers to the implementation of human resource management programs; forecasting and establishing long-term survey and compliance readiness activities, including mock rounds and mitigating issues, to maintain compliance and regulatory standards and defining standards for audit documentation, information, and reports; and ensuring short and long-range financial goals are met by establishing and controlling the department budget and ensuring overall financial performance meets expectations.
• Ensures standardized care delivery by: leveraging enterprise interdependencies across multiple programs and/or program workstreams to align key care delivery initiatives across KP; assuming accountability for short- and long-term results and performance while ensuring guideline and regulation alignment for regional shared services cross-functionality; building relationships with key leaders internal and external to KP to develop and implement patient management solutions; anticipating and aligning resources in clinical areas to ensure appropriate assignment and utilization for regional shared services cross-functionality; overseeing multidisciplinary ambulatory leaders and service lines; planning the long-term strategic goals of emergency preparedness programs, overseeing regional shared services cross-functionality, and ensuring the shared services emergency preparedness and recovery plans are current and that managers and staff are trained and know what is expected during and after an emergency; providing strategic direction to project teams leading initiatives and overseeing implementation, equitable distribution of resources, and delivery on objectives; and defining and maintaining oversight, and communication at the enterprise level.
• Oversees improvements to patient-centered operations and technology processes by: forecasting and determining the direction of future strategic projects and providing oversight for multiple internal and external strategic projects designed to remediate issues and improve quality, service, affordability, and/or operating efficiency; using broad trends from analysis across operations processes to identify and facilitate implementation of new practices and solutions to optimize the performance of operations system processes; and consulting with executive management for the effective integration of performance metrics to monitor the success and sustainability of strategic improvement projects across the organization.