Community Engagement & Business Development Manager

The Community Engagement & Business Development Manager supports the mission of The Healing Place of New Hanover County by building the community relationships and referral partnerships that connect individuals in need with timely, low-barrier withdrawal management and recovery services. This role assists in developing the strategy to grow and stabilize the utilization of organization's social setting detox program. The ideal candidate is a strategic, data-driven relationship builder who understands the substance use treatment landscape, communicates the organization's value with credibility, and is passionate about ensuring no one in our community is turned away from help.

This position reports to the Director of Development but is functionally separate from fundraising, focused entirely on referral partnerships, community engagement, and access to care.

• Identify, cultivate, and maintain referral partnerships with hospitals and emergency departments, behavioral health crisis and urgent care centers, LME/MCOs and Tailored Plan care managers, primary care and FQHCs, opioid treatment programs, EMS and post-overdose response teams, law enforcement, courts and treatment courts, detention centers, homeless services, faith communities, and employers.
• Develop and execute an annual referral development plan with territory mapping, priority accounts, and a defined visit and follow-up cadence.
• Conduct regular in-person visits, presentations, and in-service education for referral partners on the program's services, admission process, and low-barrier access.
• Serve as the primary point of contact for referral partners, resolving referral barriers quickly and professionally.

• Lead the strategy to achieve and sustain an average daily census in the detox program.
• Partner with admissions, monitor, and program staff to streamline the referral-to-admission process, reduce time to admission, and minimize lost referrals.
• Monitor daily census, referral volume, conversion rates, referral source mix, and reasons for non-admission, and take timely action on emerging trends.

• Maintain a referral tracking or CRM system with complete, current records of all partner contacts, activities, and outcomes.
• Produce monthly census and referral dashboards and monthly reports for the Director of Development and Executive Director, with quarterly summaries for the Board of Directors.
• Track and report key performance indicators, including average daily census, referrals by source, referral-to-admission conversion, time to admission, new partners added, and partner retention.
• Use data to identify service gaps, underserved populations and geographies, and new growth opportunities.

• Represent The Healing Place of New Hanover County on community coalitions, task forces, and planning bodies, including local opioid settlement and substance use prevention efforts.
• Collaborate with the Development team to create outreach materials and presentations that are accurate, consistent with the organization's brand, and use person-first, non-stigmatizing language.
• Educate the community about substance use disorder, the social model of recovery, and how to access services.
• Refer any philanthropic, sponsorship, or grant opportunities identified in the community to the Development team rather than pursuing them directly.

• Conduct all business development in full compliance with the federal Anti-Kickback Statute, the Eliminating Kickbacks in Recovery Act (EKRA), North Carolina law, and organizational policy; never offer, solicit, or accept anything of value in exchange for referrals.
• Maintain a firewall between referral relationships and fundraising: do not solicit or accept donations, sponsor ships, or gifts from referral sources, and do not use donor relationships to generate referrals.
• Adhere to recognized ethical marketing standards for addiction treatment providers, such as those of LegitScript and the NAATP Code of Ethics.
• Protect client privacy in all referral communications in full compliance with HIPAA and 42 CFR Part 2, obtaining valid consent before any disclosure.
• Represent services, level of care, eligibility, and outcomes accurately and truthfully in all communications.
• Uphold the principle that admission decisions are made on clinical appropriateness under ASAM criteria and…