What are the responsibilities and job description for the Provider Relations Specialist IV - Provider Services position at Kaiser Permanente?
The ideal candidate is a strategic leader with experience in healthcare delivery, managed care operations, customer relationship management, and provider relations. They have demonstrated leadership experience and a proven ability to build strong provider partnerships, improve provider satisfaction, and ensure regulatory and contractual compliance. This individual excels at collaborating with cross-functional stakeholders, driving process improvements, analyzing provider and market data, and implementing solutions that improve access to care and operational performance. Strong communication, relationship-building, project management, and problem-solving skills are essential, along with the ability to influence stakeholders and lead complex initiatives that support organizational and provider network success.
Note: Work location is on-site with the flexibility to work remotely, the primary location will be in-office for meetings, per Kaiser Permanente-s Authorized States Policy - Employees may be required to travel to a Kaiser Permanente or customer site. Residency required in the primary location: 9 Piedmont Center, 3495 Piedmont Rd., NE, Atlanta, Georgia 30305
Job Summary:
In addition to the responsibilities listed below, this position is also responsible for planning, developing, and implementing provider satisfaction strategies to improve network relationships and enhance provider engagement; developing provider relations programs to facilitate effective provider communications and problem resolution; and creating and distributing media materials (e.g., articles and newsletters), publications, and manual updates to providers; ensuring providers adhere to regulatory and contractual requirements; escalating complex compliance issues to appropriate parties; supporting organizational responses to regulatory audits; and delivering provider education and/or onboarding.
Essential Responsibilities:
- Promotes learning in others by proactively providing and/or developing information, resources, advice, and expertise with coworkers and members; builds relationships with cross-functional/external stakeholders and customers. Listens to, seeks, and addresses performance feedback; proactively provides actionable feedback to others and to managers. Pursues self-development; creates and executes plans to capitalize on strengths and develop weaknesses; leads by influencing others through technical explanations and examples and provides options and recommendations. Adopts new responsibilities; adapts to and learns from change, challenges, and feedback; demonstrates flexibility in approaches to work; champions change and helps others adapt to new tasks and processes. Facilitates team collaboration to support a business outcome.
- Completes work assignments autonomously and supports business-specific projects by applying expertise in subject area and business knowledge to generate creative solutions; encourages team members to adapt to and follow all procedures and policies. Collaborates cross-functionally and/or externally to achieve effective business decisions; provides recommendations and solves complex problems; escalates high-priority issues or risks, as appropriate; monitors progress and results. Supports the development of work plans to meet business priorities and deadlines; identifies resources to accomplish priorities and deadlines. Identifies, speaks up, and capitalizes on improvement opportunities across teams; uses influence to guide others and engages stakeholders to achieve appropriate solutions.
- Supports continuous improvement efforts by: utilizing provider, claims, and contracting data to identify and/or consult on continuous improvement across the contract ecosystem (e.g., identifying business and operational disparities between organizational and provider expectations, constraints, and risks to accessible care, building and maintaining relationships); implementing process improvement initiatives to aid providers and business goals; participating in collaborations with internal and external partners to develop network strategies and implement improved access to care; and may also include conducting and/or collaborating on advanced modeling and analyses of provider and market data to develop recommendations, solutions, and action plans for improvement initiatives.
- Ensures contract commitments are met by: gathering, validating, maintaining, summarizing, and/or analyzing provider and contract data of the day-to-day operation and management of services to consult on provider compliance; identifying and documenting provider activities and/or coordinating with alternate stakeholders to ensure compliance with contract terms and conditions; leveraging guidelines to ensure provider compliance with state and federal regulations as well as KP policies and procedures; and consulting with Provider Systems Administration (PSA) or its equivalent as needed to ensure proper contract interpretation and operational readiness and supporting corrective actions as identified through contract performance.
- Supports contract strategy development by: researching, developing, and assisting in the proposal and implementation of strategies that improve access to patient care while managing outside service costs; providing advanced consultation on local service delivery planning and delivery system leadership to aid in the achievement of provider priorities and strategies; may include engaging in collaborative cross-functional workgroups to ensure provider strategies meet the unique needs of diverse stakeholders; and may also include developing materials and/or conducting peer training for new hires and contingent workers(e.g., establishing contract language, determining payment rate parameters, defining workflow and business processes, and ensuring cross-training across all service lines).
- Supports the growth of the Provider Network by: reviewing or identifying recommended/potential partners/alliances for assigned service area to fill service gaps or decrease costs in current service offerings; developing and maintaining trusted partnerships with providers to understand their unique service request needs and challenges; serving as a liaison between providers and KP by contributing to communication efforts (e.g., contract compliance such as access, availability, referral operations, and/or supporting member complaints); and supporting provider site visits, daily interactions, and ad hoc meetings by partnering with others to develop itineraries and agendas, gather credentialing materials, and/or initiate this process.
- Contributes to provider satisfaction by: leveraging in-depth knowledge of provider/contract operations to consult on issues that arise from contract configuration/interpretation and/or related to claims/disputes, billing, payment, reimbursement, other operational issues, and/or directories; ensuring requests for information, questions, and problems are identified, documented, and addressed in a timely manner; and in some instances, collaborating, creating, and/or delivering training materials to aid provider education and orientation on health plan systems, processes, and/or credentialing.
Qualifications:
Knowledge, Skills and Abilities: (Core)
- Ambiguity/Uncertainty Management
- Attention to Detail
- Business Knowledge
- Communication
- Critical Thinking
- Cross-Group Collaboration
- Decision Making
- Dependability
- Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Support
- Drives Results
- Facilitation Skills
- Health Care Industry
- Influencing Others
- Integrity
- Learning Agility
- Organizational Savvy
- Problem Solving
- Short- and Long-term Learning & Recall
- Teamwork
- Topic-Specific Communication
Knowledge, Skills and Abilities: (Functional)
- Internal or External Publication
- Provider Data Systems/Processes
- Applied Data Analysis
- Business Acumen
- Business Planning
- Business Process Improvement
- Business Relationship Management
- Compliance Management
- Computer Literacy
- Consulting
- Health Care Reimbursement
- Interpersonal Skills
- Key Performance Indicators
- Knowledge Management
- Presentation Skills
- Project Management
- Quality Assurance Process
- Time Management
- Training
- Trend Analysis
- Written Communication
Minimum Qualifications:
- Minimum one (1) year of experience in a leadership role with or without direct reports.
- High School Diploma or GED AND minimum seven (7) years of experience in health care delivery or operations in a managed care environment, customer relationship management, or a directly related field.
Preferred Qualifications:
- Two (2) years of experience working with Microsoft Excel, including working with formulas and developing integrated workbooks.
- Three (3) years of experience with industry standard claims coding and submission processes.
Salary : $84,600 - $109,450