Director of Health Equity and Cultural Competency

At UnitedHealthcare, we’re simplifying the health care experience, creating healthier communities and removing barriers to quality care. The work you do here impacts the lives of millions of people for the better. Come build the health care system of tomorrow, making it more responsive, affordable and equitable. Ready to make a difference? Join us and start doing your life's best work.(sm)

The Director of Health Equity and Cultural Competency for AZ oversees the implementation of the health plan’s health equity, disparity reduction, and diversity, equity, and inclusion vision. The person in this role is expected to work directly with colleagues across the health plan to build relationships and proactively identify disparity reducing and equity increasing opportunities through analysis and discussion with subject matter experts. The individual must be comfortable with creating presentations and working with data to formally present information to internal stakeholders as well as physicians, administrators, other providers and community partners.

This is a hybrid role This role requires travel locally up to 40% of the time. Travel will be required to state sponsored meetings, meetings with providers, community events and to community based organizations

Primary Responsibilities:

• In close coordination with the Medical Directors and Executive Leadership Team, will oversee the plan’s strategic design, implementation, and evaluation of health equity efforts
• Inform decision-making around best payer practices related to disparity reductions, including
• the provision of health equity and social determinants of health resources and research to leadership and programmatic areas
• providing the health plan’s teams with relevant and applicable resources and research and ensuring the perspectives of members with disparate outcomes are incorporated into the tailoring of intervention strategies
• Collaborate with the health plan’s internal and shared services data and analytics partners to ensure the health plan collects and meaningfully uses race, ethnicity, gender and language data to identify disparities
• Identifies health disparities experienced by Arizona individuals receiving Medicaid benefits and works with internal and external partners to build solutions that mitigate inequities
• Designs, implements, and evaluates programs to reduce health disparities. Uses data to drive decision-making and measurement of progress. Includes internal and external sources such as HIE, SDOH, DUGless, and AHCCCS 834
• Coordinate and collaborate with members, providers, local and state government, community-based organizations, AHCCCS, DDD, and other external stakeholders to impact health disparities at a population level
• Provides visionary leadership and contributes to the successful advancement of culture, health equity and social responsibility principles. Being a champion of culture, cultivating innovation, and inspiring others
• Builds and deploys strategies and initiatives that identify structural racism and reduce implicit, explicit and institutional bias experienced by people of color and other marginalized communities.
• Demonstrates organizational agility and understands how the business operates and can identify and interpret business levers. Creates experiences that shape and grow the organizations’ culture programs and capabilities

Health Plan Focus:

• Active member of health plan leadership team
• Collaborates with OIFA, Provider, and Member facing teams to develop strategies and educational materials to mitigate inequities
• Key leader for and contributes to the health plan’s Housing Strategies, Health Disparity Action Plan, Health Disparity and Annual Report, and other related Regulatory commitments
• Serves as the Key Staff position for Cultural Competency which includes the Annual Cultural Competency Plan for AHCCCS
• Serves as a liaison with the Arizona based HIE and SDOH CLRS to drive strategies improving the collection and utilization of data addressing Health Disparities
• Support the Arizona Health Plan’s Diversity, Equity, & Inclusion (DE&I) Council through coaching, mentoring, and facilitating training with the goal of strengthening the health plan’s understanding of health equity
• Support NCQA Health Equity Accreditation (TBD)
• Develop, contribute and support the implementation of health equity learning & development strategies for internal audiences
• Create metrics and methodology to determine performance of health equity learning and development strategies

You’ll be rewarded and recognized for your performance in an environment that will challenge you and give you clear direction on what it takes to succeed in your role as well as provide development for other roles you may be interested in.

Required Qualifications:

• Bachelor's degree from a recognized college or university or equivalent work experience
• 5+ years of professional work experience, preferably in public health, social/human services, social work, public policy, heath care, education, community development, justice or experience leading and developing broad scale organizational/enterprise diversity, inclusion and equity strategies
• 3+ years of experience interfacing with Senior Leadership
• Experience addressing health disparity, health equity and/or cultural competency concerns
• Experience and knowledge of change management principles, methodologies and tools
• Experience working with and leading cross-functional teams and projects
• Demonstrated community and stakeholder engagement experience
• Intermediate or greater level of proficiency with MS Project, Excel, Visio, PowerPoint and SharePoint
• Proven excellent time management, organizational, and prioritization skills with ability to balance multiple priorities
• Proven advanced problem-solving and analytical skills
• Must reside in Arizona - commutable to downtown Phoenix office and Phoenix metro area

Preferred Qualifications:

• Master’s in Business/Healthcare Administration, Public Health or related field
• Experience working with Medicaid and/or Medicare programs
• Experience working in a matrix environment
• Experience working with and influencing all levels of employees; inspiring others to engage, participate and act
• Experience in actively applying or overseeing the application of science-based quality improvement methods to reduce health disparities
• Proven excellent communication skills - verbal, interpersonal, presentation, and facilitation along with written message development
• Proven track record of effectively managing conflict, resolving issues, mitigating risks and influencing leaders

Careers at UnitedHealthcare Community & State. Challenge brings out the best in us. It also attracts the best. That's why you'll find some of the most amazingly talented people in health care here. We serve the health care needs of low income adults and children with debilitating illnesses such as cardiovascular disease, diabetes, HIV/AIDS and high-risk pregnancy. Our holistic, outcomes-based approach considers social, behavioral, economic, physical and environmental factors. Join us. Work with proactive health care, community and government partners to heal health care and create positive change for those who need it most. This is the place to do your life's best work.(sm)

At UnitedHealth Group, our mission is to help people live healthier lives and make the health system work better for everyone. We believe everyone–of every race, gender, sexuality, age, location and income–deserves the opportunity to live their healthiest life. Today, however, there are still far too many barriers to good health which are disproportionately experienced by people of color, historically marginalized groups and those with lower incomes. We are committed to mitigating our impact on the environment and enabling and delivering equitable care that addresses health disparities and improves health outcomes — an enterprise priority reflected in our mission.

Diversity creates a healthier atmosphere: UnitedHealth Group is an Equal Employment Opportunity/Affirmative Action employer and all qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, age, national origin, protected veteran status, disability status, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, marital status, genetic information, or any other characteristic protected by law.

UnitedHealth Group is a drug-free workplace. Candidates are required to pass a drug test before beginning employment.