Product Strategist, Principal - ASO Pharmacy Buy Ups

Pharmacy Product Strategist, Principal

The Pharmacy Product Strategist, Principal, reporting to the Director Self-Funded & Buy-Ups, is responsible for creating, scaling, and optimizing pharmacy products that drive incremental revenue, employer growth, and pharmacy penetration in the self-funded employer market. This role is responsible for creating a multi-year product roadmap and launching new pharmacy programs offerings. The Pharmacy Product Strategist, Principal will work cross-departmentally with Sales, Underwriting/Actuarial, Clinical Pharmacy, and Operations to ensure programs align with the enterprise strategic vision, Line of Business goals, and meet the needs of our clients and members.

Our leadership model is about developing great leaders at all levels and creating opportunities for our people to grow – personally, professionally, and financially. We are looking for leaders that are energized by creative and critical thinking, building and sustaining high-performing teams, getting results the right way, and fostering continuous learning.

Responsibilities

In this role, you will:

• Develop pharmacy program strategy to grow and retain pharmacy membership
• Develop and maintain a dynamic 3-to-5-year pharmacy product roadmap
• Identify and develop new revenue-producing pharmacy products, riders, and buy-up options, including differentiated pharmacy models by employer segment
• Lead cross-functional workgroups for complex pharmacy product implementations
• Develop business cases with pharmacy revenue and growth projections
• Translate market needs into commercially attractive pharmacy value propositions that balance cost control, transparency, and member experience
• Own end-to-end pharmacy product lifecycle, from concept and business case through launch, performance monitoring, and optimization
• Continuously refine pharmacy products based on performance, employer feedback, market signals, and financial results

Qualifications

Your knowledge and experience:

• Requires a bachelor's degree in Business, Finance, Economics, Public Health, or similar fields or equivalent experience; master's degree preferred
• Requires a minimum of 10 years of relevant experience in Product Management, Management Consulting, or a similar function, ideally within a Health Plan or Pharmacy Benefit Manager (PBM)
• Requires expert knowledge of product management and strategic planning principles
• Prior experience in pharmacy benefit strategy and solutions development with understanding of pharmacy levers and marketplace requirements preferred
• Strong business acumen with proven experience in strategy development and planning
• Excellent presentation, verbal and written skills with ability to understand and convey complex ideas to audience with diverse backgrounds
• Ability to build effective relationships across the organization in a matrixed environment and externally, with vendors and business partners
• Strong quantitative and analytical skills that help drive data driven decisions strongly preferred
• Demonstrated experience of successfully developing and launching healthcare products or services strongly preferred

Hybrid

This role requires employees to be in-office based on our hybrid workplace model, balancing purposeful in-person collaboration with flexibility. For most teams, this means coming into the office two days each week.

Employees living more than 50 miles from an office location will work with their manager to determine in-office time based on business need.

About Us

About Blue Shield of California

As of January 2025, Blue Shield of California became a subsidiary of Ascendiun. Ascendiun is a nonprofit corporate entity that is the parent to a family of organizations including Blue Shield of California and its subsidiary, Blue Shield of California Promise Health Plan; Altais, a clinical services company; and Stellarus, a company designed to scale healthcare solutions. Together, these organizations are referred to as the Ascendiun Family of Companies.

At Blue Shield of California, our mission is to create a healthcare system worthy of our family and friends and sustainably affordable. We are transforming health care in a way that genuinely serves our nonprofit mission by lowering costs, improving quality, and enhancing the member and physician experience.

To achieve our mission, we foster an environment where all employees can thrive and contribute fully to address the needs of the various communities we serve. We are committed to creating and maintaining a supportive workplace that upholds our values and advances our goals.

Blue Shield is a U.S. News Best Company to work for, a Deloitte U.S. Best Managed Company and a Top 100 Inspiring Workplace. We were recognized by Fair360 as a Top Regional Company, and one of the 50 most community-minded companies in the United States by Points of Light. Here at Blue Shield, we strive to make a positive change across our industry and communities – join us!

Our Values:

• Honest. We hold ourselves to the highest ethical and integrity standards. We build trust by doing what we say we're going to do and by acknowledging and correcting where we fall short.
• Human. We strive to listen and communicate effectively, showing empathy by understanding others' perspectives.
• Courageous. We stand up for what we believe in and are committed to the hard work necessary to achieve our ambitious goals.

Our Workplace Model

We believe in fostering a workplace environment that balances purposeful in-person collaboration with flexibility - providing clear expectations while respecting the diverse needs of our workforce. Our workplace model is designed around intentional in-person interaction, collaboration, connection, creativity and flexibility:

• For most teams, this means coming into the office two days per week.
• Employees living more than 50 miles from an office location, out of state employees, and employees in certain member-facing roles should work with their manager to determine in-office time based on business need.
• For employees with medical conditions that may impact their ability to work in-office, we are committed to engaging in an interactive process and providing reasonable accommodations to ensure their work environment is conducive to their success and well-being.

The Company reserves the right to require more presence in the office based on business needs, and requirements are subject to change with periodic reviews.

Physical Requirements:

Office Environment - roles involving part to full time schedule in Office Environment. Based in our physical offices and work from home office/deskwork - Activity level: Sedentary, frequency most of work day.

Please click here for further physical requirement detail.

Equal Employment Opportunity:

External hires must pass a background check/drug screen. Qualified applicants with arrest records and/or conviction records will be considered for employment in a manner consistent with Federal, State and local laws, including but not limited to the San Francisco Fair Chance Ordinance. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regards to race, color, religion, sex, national origin, sexual orientation, gender identity, protected veteran status or disability status and any other classification protected by Federal, State and local laws.