Sr. Director of Market Management in Oak Brook, Illinois at UNITE HERE HEALTH

UNITE HERE HEALTH serves 200,000+ workers and their families in the hospitality and gaming industry nationwide. Our desire to be innovative and progressive drives us to develop impactful programs and benefits designed to engage our participants in managing their own health and healthcare. Our vision is exciting and challenging. Please read on to learn more about this great opportunity!

PURPOSE

The Sr. Director of Market Management is responsible for enterprise-level performance, sustainability, and strategic positioning across geographic markets. Serving as a senior executive market owner, this role holds full accountability for financial and operational outcomes—including cost, quality, utilization, and access—while setting strategic direction, identifying key drivers of variation, and leading high-impact initiatives to improve results across markets.

In addition, the Sr. Director plays a forward-looking strategic role by integrating market, regulatory, and competitive insights to anticipate trends, risks, and opportunities. They shape enterprise strategy through partnerships, innovative contracting, and coalition efforts, while engaging executive stakeholders to drive system-level improvements. The role also serves as a trusted advisor to leadership and trustees, ensuring alignment, informed decision-making, and enterprise-wide accountability.

ESSENTIAL JOB FUNCTIONS AND DUTIES

Market Performance and Financial Stewardship

• Own, lead, and be ultimately accountable for market-level performance against budget, including medical cost, utilization, quality, and access (future metric: member experience) indicators ensuring alignment with budget and strategic goals.

• Set strategic direction and performance expectations across markets, ensuring consistency with enterprise priorities.

• Partner with analytics team to assess drivers of cost and performance variation (e.g., provider pricing, site of care, utilization patterns, network leakage, benefit design interaction).
• Provide executive oversight of performance insights and ensure translation into enterprise-level strategy.
• Identify underperforming trends and develop clear, data-driven recommendations for action, including network, contracting, clinical, or operational interventions.
• Partner with Finance, Clinical, Network, and Operations teams to evaluate financial impact, feasibility, and implementation pathways for recommended changes.
• Drive enterprise-level decision-making and prioritize initiatives based on financial impact and strategic alignment.
• Support leadership and trustee discussions with fact-based analysis and strategic options and proactively escalate high-impact risks and opportunities through governance forums.

Market Strategy and Development

• Establish and lead a multi-market, forward-looking strategy that reflects local union, plan, and employer needs while aligning with enterprise growth and sustainability objectives.

• Lead the development of a market-specific strategy that reflects local union, plan and employer needs and considers local healthcare dynamics, provider landscape, and regulatory environment.
• Assess competitive positioning and emerging market forces (provider consolidation, new entrants, alternative payment models, employer coalitions, academic systems).
• Define strategic imperatives and investment priorities across markets.
• Anticipate market-level healthcare cost trends and proactively recommend actions to mitigate risk or capture opportunity.
• Identify opportunities to strengthen position through targeted partnerships, innovative contracting, care delivery alignment, or benefit strategy refinement.
• Champion innovation and scalable market solutions across regions.

Regulatory and Legislative Monitoring

• Provide strategic oversight of regulatory risks and opportunities across markets.
• Track and interpret state and local regulatory and legislative developments that may impact healthcare costs, provider behavior, or plan operations.
• Translate developments into actionable insights and strategic implications for the market.
• Collaborate with internal policy, legal, and compliance teams to ensure market strategies align with regulatory requirements and emerging mandates.
• Advise executive leadership on regulatory strategy and implications for long-term planning.

Provider, Partner and Coalition Engagement

• Serve as an executive-level representative for the organization in key external relationships.
• Build and maintain relationships with key provider systems, community stakeholders, and external partners within the market.
• Identify and participate in market coalitions or collaborative efforts that can influence provider behavior, pricing, quality transparency, or access.
• Lead high-impact negotiations or strategic discussions in complex or highly consolidated markets.
• Support or lead discussions that create collective market pressure for change, particularly in high-cost or highly consolidated markets.

Governance, Reporting and Decision Support

• Develop concise, executive-level market performance summaries and strategic recommendations for senior leadership and trustees.
• Own executive reporting frameworks and ensure alignment with enterprise KPIs and board-level expectations.
• Establish clear success metrics and tracking mechanisms for market interventions and strategic initiatives.
• Serve as the central point of accountability for market performance discussions, escalation, and decision-making support.
• Influence governance structures and ensure effective decision-making across leadership forums.

Other

• Set goals and achieve measurable results.
• Contributes ideas to plans and achieving department goals.
• Exemplifies the Fund’s BETTER Values and professional effectiveness dimensions in contributing to a respectful, trusting, and engaged culture of diversity and inclusion.
• Performs other duties as assigned within the scope of responsibilities and requirements of the job.
• Performs Essential Job Functions and Duties with or without reasonable accommodation.

Market Management – Market Analytics Partnership Model

• Market Management: owns performance, strategy and recommendations.
• Market Analytics: owns insights, analysis, and performance intelligence.
• Shared Accountability: Translating data into action and measurable outcomes.
• Senior Director Accountability: ensures integration of insights into enterprise strategy and measurable business outcomes.

ESSENTIAL QUALIFICATIONS

Years of Experience and Knowledge

• 10–15+ years of progressive experience in healthcare strategy, health plan operations, network management, consulting, or market analytics.
• Demonstrated expertise in healthcare cost drivers, provider contracting dynamics, and market-level performance analysis.
• Experience navigating or assessing healthcare regulatory and legislative environments at the state or local level.
• Experience working in high-cost, highly consolidated provider markets (e.g., major metropolitan areas).
• Familiarity with Taft-Hartley or multi-employer health plan environments (preferred, not required).
• Exposure to coalition-based purchasing, employer collaboratives, or value-based care initiatives.
• Demonstrated success in leading large-scale strategic initiatives and influencing executive-level decisions.

Education, Licenses, and Certifications

• Bachelor’s degree required; Master’s degree (MBA, MHA, MPH, or related) strongly preferred.

Skills and Abilities

• Strong analytical skills with the ability to translate complex data into clear, actionable recommendations.
• Executive-level communication skills with the ability to present to senior leadership or boards.
• Proven ability to influence cross-functional stakeholders and external partners without direct authority.
• Strategic mindset paired with operational discipline and follow-through.
• Exceptional organizational, planning and prioritization skills with ability to manage competing deadlines and multiple projects in a fast-paced environment.
• Nimble business mind with a focus on developing creative solutions.

Salary range for this position: $172,100 ~ $219,400. Actual base salary may vary based upon, but not limited to: relevant experience, qualifications, expertise, certifications, licenses, education or equivalent work experience, time in role, peer and market data, prior performance, business sector, and geographic location.

Work Schedule (may vary to meet business needs): Monday~Friday, 7.5 hours per day (37.5 hours per week).

We reward great work with great benefits, including but not limited to: Medical, Dental, Vision, Paid Time-Off (PTO), Paid Holidays, 401(k), Pension, Short- & Long-term Disability, Life, AD&D, Flexible Spending Accounts (healthcare & dependent care), Commuter Transit, Tuition Assistance, and Employee Assistance Program (EAP).