Supervisory Medical Support Assistant

Summary

The GS-8 Supervisory Medical Support Assistant (MSA) is assigned to the VAWNYHS Care in the Health Administration Service (HAS) under the direct supervision of the Chief of HAS. The incumbent serves as a Supervisory Medical Support Assistant in HAS in a supervisory role. Duties may be performed in Clinic Based Outpatient Clinic (CBOC), Inpatient Unit, Call Center, Outpatient Clinic, or Patient Aligned Care Team (PACT) model or a Specialty Care Setting.

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Duties

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The incumbent has a large scope of responsibility over a major clinical area (i.e. Surgery, BVAC) for the healthcare system including supervision of subordinate Supervisory MSA and Lead MSAs.

Duties include, but are not limited to:

• Assigning and evaluating the work of subordinate staff, performance evaluations, selection of staff, and recommendation of awards and/or advancements.
• Resolving complex problems to ensure patient services are met; evaluating new products, equipment, and systems in order to make recommendations for improved operations.
• Identifying educational or training needs; making final decisions on selections; evaluating performance, and taking disciplinary action when necessary.
• Has full administrative and professional responsibility for planning and directing the MSA's activities and is responsible for extracting and analyzing data to provide reports in support of performance measures to senior management.
• Works collaboratively with all clinical business managers and frontline staff throughout the Primary Care and Specialty Clinics, in the Specialty Clinics Call Center and Primary Care Call Center.
• Develops and maintains effective and efficient communication with all departmental leadership, respective Care Line Managers and service line managers and frontline staff, serving as a core member of the HAS and Clinical Service leadership.
• Knowledge of administrative policies and procedures at facility and network level that impact HAS and Business Operations, information security and exchange, management of reports and data, scheduling directives, telephone care, and public relations/customer service.
• Knowledgeable and skilled in the operation of a personal computer utilizing a wide variety of software, utilizing multiple computer applications in the performance of all duties including Vista (entry and retrieval of administrative and clinical data to include numerous existing report options and specialized queries), VSSC, CPRS (to include monitoring of outpatient workload data capture), Microsoft Office products for word processing, spreadsheets, and relational data base programs.
• Serves as a resource to HAS staff in use of applications, and must have the ability to extract, correlate and analyze patient encounter and provider workload data make recommendations to the Leadership team and acts as a customer service representative for HAS.
• Has detailed knowledge of outpatient administrative processes, release of information, records management schedules for ambulatory care clinics, workload data capture, encounter forms, and VISTA scheduling package, maintaining full responsibility and accountability for the scheduling practices.
• Provide training, implementation, monitoring and evaluation of all administrative procedures related to HAS operations.
• Provide oversight and has programming responsibility for all automated and special patient correspondence letters generated through the Appointment Management computer program.
• Plans and organizes work and acts independently in daily operations, resolving issues under the guidance and supervision of the Chief, HAS and Supervisor.
• Performing other duties, as required.

Work Schedule : Monday - Friday (7:30am - 4:00pm)

Telework : Ad-hoc telework may be available

Virtual: This is not a virtual position.

Functional Statement # : 21S71-A

Relocation/Recruitment Incentives : Not Authorized

Permanent Change of Station (PCS): Not Authorized

Requirements

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Conditions of employment

• You must be a U.S. Citizen to apply for this job.
• All applicants tentatively selected for VA employment in a testing designated position are subject to urinalysis to screen for illegal drug use prior to appointment. Applicants who refuse to be tested will be denied employment with VA.
• Selective Service Registration is required for males born after 12/31/1959.
• Must be proficient in written and spoken English.
• Subject to background/security investigation.
• Selected applicants will be required to complete an online onboarding process. Acceptable form(s) of identification will be required to complete pre-employment requirements ( Effective May 7, 2025, driver's licenses or state-issued identification cards that are not REAL ID compliant cannot be utilized as an acceptable form of identification for employment.
• Must pass pre-employment physical examination.
• Participation in the seasonal influenza vaccination program is a requirement for all Department of Veterans Affairs Health Care Personnel (HCP).
• Complete all application requirements detailed in the "Required Documents" section of this announcement.

As a condition of employment for accepting this position, you will be required to serve a 1 or 2-year trial period during which we will evaluate your fitness and whether your continued employment advances the public interest. In determining if your employment advances the public interest, we may consider:

• your performance and conduct;
• the needs and interests of the agency;
• whether your continued employment would advance organizational goals of the agency or the Government; and
• whether your continued employment would advance the efficiency of the Federal service.

Upon completion of your trial period, your employment will be terminated unless you receive certification, in writing, that your continued employment advances the public interest.

Qualifications

Applicants pending the completion of educational or certification/licensure requirements may be referred and tentatively selected but may not be hired until all requirements are met.

Basic Requirements : To qualify for appointment to this position, all applicants must possess the following

• United States Citizenship: Non-citizens may only be appointed when it is not possible to recruit qualified citizens in accordance with VA Policy.
• Experience . None.
• Education . High school diploma, General Education Development equivalency certificate, or proficiency certificate from a State or territorial-level Board or Department of Education.
• Licensure/Certification/Registration . None.
• Grandfathering Provision . May qualify based on being covered by the Grandfathering Provision as described in the VA Qualification Standard for this occupation (only applicable to current VHA employees who are in this occupation and meet the criteria).
• Foreign Education . To be creditable, education completed outside the U.S. must be deemed at least equivalent to that gained in a conventional U.S. program by a private organization specializing in the interpretation of foreign educational credentials.
• English Language Proficiency . Candidates must be proficient in spoken and written English in accordance with 38 U.S.C. § 7403(f).

Grade Determinations: Supervisory Medical Support Assistant, GS-08 : In addition to the basic requirements for employment, candidates must meet the following grade-determining criteria for placement at grade levels specified.

Experience. One year of creditable experience equivalent to the next lower grade (GS-07). Qualifying experience includes but is not limited to: assigning and evaluating the work of subordinate MSA staff; resolving complex problems to ensure patient services are met; evaluating new products, equipment, and systems to make recommendations for improved clinic operations; identifying educational or training needs; making final decisions on hiring selections; evaluating performance, and taking disciplinary action when necessary.

Knowledge, Skills, and Abilities (KSAs). In addition to the experience above, the candidate must demonstrate the following KSAs:

• Advanced knowledge of managing or leading patient support staff in a clinic. This includes independently utilizing reference sources, decision making, and empowering the team to collaborate and resolve problems within a complex systems environment.
• Ability to provide the full range of administrative and supervisory duties to at least one subordinate MSA supervisor or team leader in a patient support setting which includes assignment of work, performance evaluations, selection of staff, and recommendation of awards and/or advancements.
• Ability to collaborate, communicate, and demonstrate customer service and interpersonal skills with internal and external customers to ensure quality/continuity of care and ensure compliance with established policies and regulations.
• Ability to provide briefings, orientations, staff development, and training in a patient support setting.
• Ability to manage fiscal matters, forecast resource and equipment needs, and identify budget needs.

Assignment . For all supervisory assignments the Supervisory MSA must spend 25% or more of their time providing administrative and technical supervision and perform major duties above those at the FPL that consist of significant scope, complexity, difficulty, and variety. Supervisory MSAs at this level plan and direct programs at medical centers and/or satellite outpatient clinics. They have full responsibility for supervising at least one subordinate MSA team leader, supervisor, or equivalent administrative patient support staff in a VA medical inpatient, outpatient, or interdisciplinary setting. Assignments at this level include but are not limited to evaluating the work of subordinate staff; resolving complex problems to ensure patient services are met; evaluating new products, equipment, and systems to make recommendations for improved operations; identifying educational or training needs; making final decisions on hiring selections; evaluating performance and taking disciplinary action when necessary. The employee has administrative and professional responsibility for planning and directing the subordinate lead, supervisor, and MSA's activities. Responsible for extracting and analyzing data to provide reports to senior management in support of tracking measures.

Creditable Experience . To be creditable, the experience must have required the use of knowledge, skills, and abilities (KSAs) associated with current MSA responsibilities or an equivalent administrative patient support role in a non-VA medical inpatient or outpatient setting. Experience satisfying this requirement may be paid or non-paid employment as an MSA or an equivalent position in a non-VA hospital or clinic setting.

Part-Time Experience . Part-time experience is creditable according to its relationship to a full-time workweek. For example, an individual employed 20 hours per week, or on a half-time basis, would receive credit for 1 full-time workweek for each 2 weeks of service.

Quality of Experience . Qualifying experience must be at a level comparable to MSA experience or equivalent administrative clinical support role in a non-VA medical inpatient or outpatient setting at the next lower grade level of the position being filled. For all assignments above the full performance level (FPL), the higher-level duties must consist of significant scope, administrative independence, complexity, and range of variety as described in this standard at the specified grade level and be performed by the incumbent at least 25% of the time.

Reference: For more information on this qualification standard, please visit

The full performance level of this vacancy is GS-08. The actual grade at which an applicant may be selected for this vacancy is GS-08.

Physical Requirements: See VA Directive and Handbook 5019.

Education

Note: Only education or degrees recognized by the U.S. Department of Education from accredited colleges, universities, schools, or institutions may be used to qualify for Federal employment. You can verify your education here: If you are using foreign education to meet qualification requirements, you must send a Certificate of Foreign Equivalency with your transcript in order to receive credit for that education. For further information, visit:

Additional information

During the application process you may have an option to opt-in to make your resume available to hiring managers in the agency who have similar positions. Opting in does not impact your application for this announcement, nor does it guarantee further consideration for additional positions.

This job opportunity announcement may be used to fill additional vacancies.

This position is in the Excepted Service and does not confer competitive status.

VA encourages persons with disabilities to apply. The health-related positions in VA are covered by Title 38, and are not covered by the Schedule A excepted appointment authority.

If you are unable to apply online or need an alternate method to submit documents, please reach out to the Agency Contact listed in this Job Opportunity Announcement.

Under the Fair Chance to Compete Act, the Department of Veterans Affairs prohibits requesting an applicant's criminal history prior to accepting a tentative job offer. For more information about the Act and the complaint process, visit Human Resources and Administration/Operations, Security, and Preparedness (HRA/OSP) at The Fair Chance Act.

Candidates should be committed to improving the efficiency of the Federal government, passionate about the ideals of our American republic, and committed to upholding the rule of law and the United States Constitution.

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A career with the U.S. government provides employees with a comprehensive benefits package. As a federal employee, you and your family will have access to a range of benefits that are designed to make your federal career very rewarding. Opens in a new windowLearn more about federal benefits.

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