System Director of Perioperative Services

Overview

The Director Perioperative Services provides strategic, operational, and clinical leadership for assigned perioperative departments, ensuring alignment with the DCH Health System Mission, Vision, Values, and organizational goals.

 

The Director is responsible for ensuring that assigned departments have the personnel, resources, systems, and processes necessary to deliver exceptional care while serving as a responsible steward of organizational resources. Through effective leadership, continuous performance improvement, workforce development, regulatory compliance, and physician partnership, the Director fosters a culture of accountability, collaboration, innovation, and excellence across all perioperative services. The Perioperative Director has responsibility for Regional and Northport campuses.

Responsibilities

Champions the DCH Health System Mission, Vision, Values, and 5 Keys to Excellence through innovative leadership and operational excellence.

Provides strategic leadership for Perioperative Services, including Surgical Services, Pre-Admission Testing, Pre-Op, PACU, Sterile Processing, Endoscopy, and other procedural areas as assigned.

Develops and implements departmental strategic plans, goals, and priorities aligned with organizational objectives and patient care initiatives.

Collaborates with the CNO, executive leadership, physicians, and department leaders to establish direction, performance expectations, and measurable outcomes.

Ensures safe, efficient, high-quality perioperative care across the continuum of surgical and procedural services.

Leads efforts to optimize operating room performance, including block utilization, first-case on-time starts, turnover times, case throughput, scheduling efficiency, and overall OR utilization.

Monitors and improves clinical quality, patient safety, and patient experience outcomes, utilizing benchmarks and best practices to achieve top-performing results.

Provides oversight of infection prevention practices, sterile processing operations, instrument management, and surgical environment standards to ensure regulatory compliance and patient safety.

Partners with surgeons, anesthesia providers, proceduralists, and nursing leaders to enhance physician engagement and operational effectiveness.

Utilizes internal and external benchmarking data to identify opportunities for improvement in quality, efficiency, patient experience, and financial performance.

Leads performance improvement initiatives focused on surgical quality, perioperative efficiency, patient outcomes, and regulatory readiness.

Develops, monitors, and achieves departmental quality indicators and operational benchmarks that support a best-in-class perioperative program.

Manages operating and capital budgets while maximizing resource utilization, reducing waste, and supporting organizational financial goals.

Oversees capital planning and equipment management, including evaluation, acquisition, replacement, and maintenance of surgical and procedural equipment.

Partners with Supply Chain and physicians to manage surgical supplies, implants, and vendor relationships, ensuring quality and cost-effectiveness.

Recruits, hires, develops, mentors, and retains highly engaged perioperative leaders and staff.

Ensures comprehensive orientation, training, competency validation, and professional development for all team members.

Promotes a culture of accountability, engagement, recognition, and continuous learning throughout perioperative services.

Manages employee performance through coaching, feedback, corrective action, and succession planning while cultivating future leaders.

Ensures staffing plans effectively meet patient volume demands, productivity expectations, call coverage requirements, and operational needs.

Develops, implements, and monitors departmental policies, procedures, and evidence-based practices consistent with professional standards and organizational goals.

Maintains continuous compliance with all applicable accrediting, regulatory, and professional standards, including CMS, Joint Commission, AORN, OSHA, and state requirements.

Serves as a change leader, facilitating implementation of new technology, equipment, workflows, and organizational initiatives.

Ensures effective communication and collaboration among staff, physicians, anesthesia providers, patients, and families, fostering a culture of service excellence and teamwork.

Advances patient-centered care, care coordination, and surgical optimization initiatives that improve quality outcomes, patient experience, length of stay, throughput, and readmission performance across the surgical continuum.

 

DCH Standards:

• Maintains performance, patient and employee satisfaction and financial standards as outlined in the performance evaluation.
• Performs compliance requirements as outlined in the Employee Handbook
• Must adhere to the DCH Mission, Vision, and Values including creating positive relationships with patients/families, coworkers, colleagues and with self.
• Performs essential job functions in a manner that ensures the safety of patients, visitors and employees.
• Identifies and reduces unsafe practices that may result in harm to patients, visitors and employees.
• Recognizes and takes appropriate action to reduce risks and hazards to promote safety for patients, visitors and employees.
• Requires use of electronic mail, time and attendance software, learning management software and intranet.
• Must adhere to all DCH Health System policies and procedures.
• All other duties as assigned.

 

Qualifications

• Registered Nurse with current Alabama/Compact License.
• BSN Required. Master's degree in Health-Related Field or must complete Health Related Master’s level program within 2 -4 years. May consider candidates with greater than 20 plus years of relevant job experience in similar role.
• Minimum 4 years progressive experience in a leadership role in a hospital setting.
• Must possess highly developed interpersonal skills to work with a variety of people including employees, physicians, board members, local, state and federal officials and hospital administrators.
• Requires financial knowledge relevant to health care and financial analysis including the budget process.
• Requires skills in compliance, planning, organizing, and managing multiple projects/tasks. 
• Must possess excellent interpersonal communication in both written and oral skills
• Demonstrates analytical, problem solving and decision-making skills. 
• American Heart Association (AHA) Basic Life Support (BLS) required; ACLS preferred
• Must be able to read, write legibly, speak and comprehend English.

Physical: 

Ability to tolerate prolonged periods of standing and walking. 

Ability to reach reasonable distance in any direction.

Physical presence onsite is essential. 

Hearing and vision must be normal or corrected to within normal range. 

Able to perform the duties with or without reasonable accommodation.

Environmental: 

Includes exposure to human body fluids, disease, infection, lab chemicals and hazard materials and/or cleaning solutions.

Requires wearing common protective or safety equipment.

Requires use of electronic mail, time and  attendance software, learning management software and intranet.

Psychological:

Includes demonstrating leadership skills, delegating to team members, addressing conflict, communicating with all types of personalities, and being responsible for outcomes/results.