Associate Director, Strategic Planning & Operations - Remote

Associate Director, Strategic Planning & Operations

Optum Life Sciences is seeking an Associate Director, Strategic Planning & Operations to support the Strategy & Enterprise Development organization. This senior individual-contributor role will translate enterprise and business priorities into coordinated plans, recurring operating rhythms, leadership reporting, governance practices, and execution visibility across strategic initiatives.

The role will partner across strategy, product, technology, data, commercial, finance, operations, and other Optum and UHG stakeholders to manage planning cycles, gather and synthesize updates, prepare leadership-ready materials, monitor progress, and strengthen organizational accountability. The position is focused on operationalizing strategy rather than independently defining enterprise strategy.

The successful candidate will be highly organized and execution-oriented, with demonstrated experience running complex planning and reporting processes, coordinating work across a matrixed organization, and driving follow-through without direct authority.

You'll enjoy the flexibility to work remotely from anywhere within the U.S. as you take on some tough challenges. For all hires in the Minneapolis or Washington, D.C. area, you will be required to work in the office a minimum of four days per week.

Primary Responsibilities:

• Support annual business planning, long-range planning, strategic priority setting, and related enterprise planning activities for Optum Life Sciences
• Establish, manage, and continuously improve operating rhythms, including monthly business reviews, annual business planning, forecasting reviews, executive reviews, and strategic planning cycles
• Translate enterprise and business priorities into actionable plans, milestones, owners, dependencies, risks, and success measures
• Collect, organize, validate, and synthesize business updates from cross-functional stakeholders for leadership review and decision-making
• Develop executive-ready presentations, strategy updates, initiative readouts, status reports, planning documents, and decision materials
• Track progress across strategic initiatives and identify risks, gaps, dependencies, trade-offs, and items requiring escalation
• Establish and maintain governance practices that improve accountability, transparency, decision quality, and execution discipline
• Coordinate across strategy, product, technology, data, commercial, finance, operations, and other Optum and UHG stakeholders
• Support KPI definition, MBO tracking, organizational performance reporting, and leadership visibility into strategic commitments and business outcomes
• Build and maintain practical planning tools, trackers, reporting views, and dashboards as needed to support operating decisions
• Identify opportunities to improve planning, reporting, documentation, governance, and cross-functional coordination processes
• Use enterprise-approved AI tools to streamline workflows, strengthen synthesis and reporting, improve work products, and support continuous improvement
• Apply AI responsibly in accordance with applicable data privacy, security, confidentiality, and approved-tool requirements

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:

• 7+ years of experience in strategic planning, strategy execution, business operations, enterprise planning, program management, management consulting, healthcare, data, technology, or a related function
• Experience translating enterprise or business priorities into execution plans, governance processes, performance-management activities, or recurring operating rhythms
• Experience in life sciences, healthcare, healthcare technology, healthcare data, analytics, provider organizations, or closely related healthcare markets
• Experience supporting and managing planning and reporting cycles, including monthly business reviews (MBRs), annual business planning (ABP), strategic planning cycles, forecasting reviews, executive reviews, and organizational reporting processes
• Experience driving execution of complex, cross-functional initiatives with documented governance, milestones, risks, dependencies, and accountability
• Experience coordinating priorities and stakeholders across multiple business functions in a matrixed organization
• Experience developing leadership presentations, reporting packages, planning documents, business updates, or executive briefing materials
• Experience influencing stakeholders and driving follow-through without direct authority
• Experience creating, maintaining, and utilizing reporting dashboards using Power BI, Tableau, Domo, or comparable business intelligence platforms to support business planning, performance management, and executive reporting

Preferred Qualifications:

• Experience supporting a CEO, business president, senior…