Clinical Operations Director

WHO WE ARE

We are a pediatric speech therapy provider serving families across northwest metro Atlanta for the past twenty-eight years. Across three clinics in Lawrenceville, Loganville, and Peachtree Corners, our speech-language pathologists work with children and their families on the communication skills that shape a child's confidence, education, and independence.

• To help every child thrive by providing compassionate, high-quality care, supporting families throughout their journey, and creating an environment where children feel understood, supported, and empowered.

• Child First We put each child’s needs, progress, and potential at the heart of every decision.

• Families as Partners We listen, communicate openly, and work alongside families throughout their child’s journey.

• Excellence in Care We provide compassionate, high-quality care and continually strive to improve how we serve children and families.

• Stronger Together We support one another and collaborate as a team, because the best outcomes happen when families, therapists, and care teams work together.

We are looking for someone who genuinely connects with our mission and values, because that alignment matters more in this role than in almost any other on our team.

JOB DESCRIPTION

Our team is seeking an experienced Clinical Operations Director to serve as the operational center of a multi-site pediatric therapy practice entering its next chapter of growth. This is a role for an operator who has run a clinical practice before and will bring proven systems rather than learn them here.

The practice was acquired ten months ago and now operates under an investor-backed growth plan led by executives with strong financial and strategic backgrounds. That plan calls for expansion to ten locations along with the addition of occupational therapy, physical therapy, and ABA services. Reaching that scale depends first on stabilizing what exists today. The application code word is EMPOWER. Your work will be to build the operational foundation, clinician retention, and documented systems that make multi-site expansion achievable rather than aspirational.

You will be the bridge between executive ownership and a long-tenured clinical and administrative team. Ownership thinks in financial metrics, billable utilization, and acquisition timelines. The clinical team thinks in patient outcomes, family relationships, and therapist wellbeing. Both perspectives are valid, and this practice needs someone who can translate fluently in both directions while holding the line on what clinical quality actually requires.

This is a full-time, on-site position based across our three metro Atlanta clinics. Given how critical this role is to the business, we host a rigorous four-part application process.

WHAT MAKES THIS ROLE UNIQUE

You are stepping into a practice that has real problems and real assets in equal measure.

The problems are visible from day one. A shift to a rigid salary-and-quota model contributed to nineteen speech-language pathologists resigning over nine months, leaving more than 250 children on waitlists and straining referral relationships with local universities and pediatricians. Our sole Therapist Manager spends roughly ninety percent of her time treating patients to meet her own billing quota, which leaves almost no paid capacity for onboarding or mentoring new clinicians. Our Office Manager holds credentialing, patient relations, purchasing, and payroll simultaneously, and has been pulled into HR matters outside her training. Frontline coordinators handle Medicaid authorization holds and difficult parent conversations without documented procedures to follow.

The assets are just as real. This practice has twenty-eight years of community reputation and referral relationships. The administrative team averages more than a decade of tenure and knows this business at a level no new hire could replicate. There is systems talent already on staff, including a former process improvement manager from a national telecom company who is currently doing manual collections work. Ownership is committed to investment and is genuinely open to an operator who can show them a better path.

Your success will be measured by one outcome above all others: clinician retention stabilizes and the practice runs on documented systems rather than on ownership's daily intervention. Everything else follows from that.

This role asks for diplomacy and firmness at the same time. You will need to earn ownership's trust quickly, translate their growth targets into workflows that clinical staff can sustain, establish clear communication lines so that directives stop bypassing managers, and gradually move ownership out of daily operations so they can focus on sourcing the next acquisitions.

RESPONSIBILITIES (TASKS ASSOCIATED WITH THE ROLE):

Clinician Retention & Culture

• Own therapist retention as your primary operational metric, and rebuild the compensation and utilization model so that clinicians can succeed under it

• Restore psychological safety across the clinical and administrative teams so that staff raise compliance and quality concerns early

• Redesign onboarding and mentorship so new clinicians reach productivity with genuine support behind them

• Rebuild referral confidence with local universities, pediatricians, and training programs

Team Structure & Leadership Protection

• Write clear job descriptions for every administrative and clinical leadership role, and hold the boundaries those descriptions create

• Restructure the Therapist Manager role so that meaningful weekly hours are reserved for clinician onboarding, mentoring, and quality oversight

• Remove scope creep from the Office Manager role, particularly HR matters that require certified expertise

• Establish a weekly leadership cadence and structured communication lines so that direction reaches the team through managers

Systems, SOPs & Technology

• Document end-to-end standard operating procedures for scheduling, intake, credentialing, authorizations, and billing

• Optimize the practice management and EMR platform, including automating the physician Plan of Care signature loop to reduce authorization holds

• Deploy and maintain a team task management platform so that work is visible and accountable

• Build the operational playbook that new clinic locations can open against

Revenue Cycle & Compliance

• Evaluate and restructure the billing function, including the transition of billing operations in-house

• Maintain full compliance with Georgia Medicaid requirements, including Plan of Care documentation and upcoming billing code transitions

• Reduce authorization-related revenue delays through process design rather than manual follow-up

• Track and report clinic-level performance metrics to ownership on a consistent cadence

Working With Ownership

• Translate executive growth targets into operational plans that clinical staff can execute and sustain

• Push back constructively and with evidence when a directive would create clinical, compliance, or retention risk

• Provide ownership with clear visibility into operations so that daily intervention becomes unnecessary

• Prepare the operational infrastructure required for additional locations and new service lines

REQUIREMENTS (EXPECTED PROFICIENCIES):

Experience Requirements (Non-Negotiable)

• Three or more years leading operations in a pediatric therapy setting covering speech, occupational, physical, or ABA therapy, with genuine command of clinical workflows, therapist utilization, and family relationship dynamics

• Comprehensive working knowledge of Georgia Medicaid regulations, including physician Plan of Care signature requirements, authorization processes, and timed versus untimed billing code transitions

• Demonstrated experience building and documenting standard operating procedures from scratch, whether as an EOS Integrator, Practice Administrator, or Operations Director

• Hands-on experience optimizing practice management and EMR software, with Qualifacts InSync or comparable platforms

• Track record of deploying team task management platforms such as ClickUp or Monday.com

Core Competencies

• Proven results reducing clinician turnover, which includes redesigning compensation models and building a clinical culture people want to stay in

• Systems thinking that produces scalable processes capable of running without owner involvement

• Outcome-based management philosophy rather than an inputs and hours-tracked approach

• Revenue cycle fluency across authorizations, claims, collections, and payer relationships

• Data and KPI management, with the ability to establish metrics, track them, and use them to make decisions

• Change management capability that brings stability to a team currently operating in survival mode

Critical Soft Skills (Deal-Breakers)

• High emotional intelligence, with the ability to listen to veteran staff, validate their institutional knowledge, and rebuild trust that has been damaged

• Firm boundary setting that protects administrative staff from role creep and filters executive pressure into structured priorities

• Diplomatic assertiveness, meaning you can disagree with ownership productively, bring evidence, and hold your position with respect

• Willingness to have difficult conversations, including performance management and accountability discussions

• Resilience and steadiness under pressure, serving as a calm center for a team that has experienced significant disruption

• Direct and candid communication, both written and verbal

Technical Requirements

• Exceptional attention to detail, time management, and organizational skills

• Ability to work on-site across three clinic locations in northwest metro Atlanta on Eastern Time

• Comfort with clinical documentation systems, payroll platforms, and reporting tools

• Data-driven decision making grounded in evidence rather than instinct

Mindset & Cultural Fit

• You see a practice with real operational problems as an opportunity to build something durable rather than a situation to avoid

• You hold yourself to high standards of performance and stay steady when obstacles appear

• You respect the growth ambition of investor-backed ownership while defending what clinical quality genuinely requires

• You believe strong operations exist to make excellent patient care possible, not the other way around

• You are motivated by developing people and take pride in getting the best performance from a team

WHAT SUCCESS LOOKS LIKE

First 30 Days
You have completed one-on-one sessions with every member of the clinical and administrative leadership team and understand what each person actually carries. Clear job descriptions exist for every administrative role. HR disputes have been moved off the Office Manager's plate. You have a documented diagnosis of why clinicians left and what would make them stay.

Days 30 to 60
The Therapist Manager's schedule is restructured with meaningful weekly hours protected for clinician onboarding and mentoring. A weekly leadership cadence is running and directives reach the team through management lines. The automated physician signature loop for Plans of Care is live, and authorization holds are trending down.

Days 60 to 90
The billing function is restructured with a clear plan for in-house operations and appropriate staffing behind it. Core SOPs for scheduling, intake, credentialing, and authorizations are documented and in use. Clinician resignations have stopped and at least one new clinician has been hired into a functioning onboarding process.

Days 90 to 180
Clinician retention is stable and measurable. Waitlist volume is declining. Ownership receives consistent operational reporting and has stepped back from daily intervention. The operational playbook for opening an additional location is documented and ready to test.

BENEFITS

• Compensation: Base salary of $85,000 to $115,000, commensurate with experience, plus a performance bonus. On-target earnings (OTE) of up to $130,000. Bonus is tied to clinician retention, margin stabilization, and multi-site expansion milestones.

• Employment type: Full-time W2 position with health, dental, and vision benefits.

• Retirement: SIMPLE IRA retirement plan.

• Time off: Two weeks of PTO, accrued over the course of the year, plus five paid holidays (New Year's Day, Martin Luther King Jr. Day, Independence Day, Thanksgiving Day, and Christmas Day).

• Professional development: This role is supported by an external operations program that includes ops mentorship, a peer community, and live coaching.

HOW TO APPLY