Lead Director - Clinical Vendor Management

Primary Purpose

This role is the senior operating leader of Aetna’s clinical vendor and value partner performance management function. The Lead Director is the primary representative of Vendor Performance in governance reviews, cross‑functional forums, and senior leadership conversations — expected to walk into a room with senior business, clinical, and finance leaders and credibly defend a performance evaluation, recommendation, or savings narrative under pressure.

This role owns the execution of the team’s major deliverables: vendor scorecards, governance review materials, performance‑based negotiation recommendations, and the monthly executive performance narrative. The Lead Director quarterbacks cross‑functional preparation across Contracting, Medical Economics, market and clinical leadership, and Care Model, and serves as the day‑to‑day operating partner for those functions.

• Performance Framework & Governance Partnership: Build and continuously evolve the end‑to‑end performance management framework for a defined portfolio of clinical vendors, including KPIs, SLAs, scorecards, performance review cadences, and escalation pathways.
• Vendor Portfolio Performance: Own performance accountability for an assigned portfolio of clinical vendors. Lead joint business reviews, identify performance gaps, drive corrective action plans, and partner with Contracting on remediation, renegotiation, or off‑boarding decisions. Surface insights that inform build‑vs‑buy decisions and align with the enterprise capability roadmap.
• Stakeholder Partnership & Executive Storytelling: Serve as a strategic partner to business stakeholders. Translate performance data into executive‑ready narratives that drive decisions; deliver monthly performance summaries to Aetna leadership and quarterly readouts to senior executive stakeholders.
• Target Tracking: Own the savings tracking and narrative for clinical vendor cost rationalization initiatives, including progress‑to‑target reporting, variance analysis, and risk identification.

• Preferred 7+ years of managed care, vendor management, value‑based care, healthcare operations, or healthcare strategy experience.
• Demonstrated executive presence and proven ability to present complex evaluations and recommendations directly to senior leadership (VP / SVP / market president level).
• Track record of representing a function or recommendation in cross‑functional forums where stakeholders may disagree or push back; comfort defending a position with data while remaining collaborative.
• Experience with clinical vendor or value partner performance management, governance, or oversight.
• Experience partnering with actuarial or analytics teams on ROI methodology, pre/post evaluation, and cohort‑matched studies.
• Familiarity with Medicare, Commercial, and Medicaid product lines and the political dynamics across business units.

• Bachelor’s degree preferred, or equivalent combination of education and professional experience.
• Advanced degree (MBA, MPH, MHA, or related) preferred.

The typical pay range for this role is: $ - $.

We take pride in offering a comprehensive and competitive mix of pay and benefits that reflects our commitment to our colleagues and their families. This full‑time position is eligible for a comprehensive benefits package designed to support the physical, emotional, and financial well‑being of colleagues and their families. The benefits for this position include medical, dental, and vision coverage, paid time off, retirement savings options, wellness programs, and other resources, based on eligibility.

Qualified applicants with arrest or conviction records will be considered for employment in accordance with all federal, state and local laws.