Assistant Vice President, Emergency Department Operations

Overview

Ardent Health is a leading provider of healthcare in growing mid-sized urban communities across the U.S. With a focus on people and investments in innovative services and technologies, Ardent is passionate about making healthcare better and easier to access. Through its subsidiaries, Ardent delivers care through a system of 30 acute care hospitals, 24,000+ team members and more than 280 sites of care with over 1,800 affiliated providers across six states.

POSITION SUMMARY:

The AVP of Emergency Department (ED) Operations provides system-level leadership for Emergency Department performance, access, throughput, and operational efficiency across multiple hospitals in several states. This leader drives improvements in ED flow, reduces boarding and diversion, and ensures standardized best practices across diverse markets.


Responsibilities

• Develops and executes systemwide ED operations and throughput strategy to improve flow, safety, and patient experience across all emergency departments.
• Standardizes ED operational workflows and models, including triage processes, fast-track/split-flow, staffing models, and surge response protocols.
• Leads system initiatives to reduce ED length of stay, LWBS, arrival-to-provider time, and other key throughput metrics.
• Partners with inpatient operations and capacity management teams to reduce ED boarding, improves admit-to-bed processes, and decreases diversion.
• Creates and monitors ED KPIs, ensuring hospital teams use analytics and dashboards to drive performance improvements.
• Conducts systemwide assessments of ED performance, identifying bottlenecks and leading targeted operational improvement plans.
• Collaborates with ED physician groups, nursing leaders, ancillary departments, and hospital executives to optimize frontline operations and workflow reliability.
• Ensures ED compliance with EMTALA and regulatory standards, maintaining high reliability in patient access, screening, and stabilization requirements.
• Leads strategic projects, including behavioral health throughput improvements, tele-triage expansion, acute care pathway development, and high-acuity patient flow redesign.
• Facilitates enterprise ED councils or leadership workgroups, promotes alignment, shares learning, and standardizes practice across the organization.

Qualifications

Required Qualifications

• Bachelor's degree in nursing, Healthcare Administration, Business, or a related field.
• 7+ years of progressive hospital or healthcare operations leadership experience.
• Demonstrated experience leading throughput, bed management, transfer center operations, or capacity management in a multi-hospital environment.
• Experience interpreting and utilizing operational analytics, dashboards, and forecasting tools.
• Strong understanding of inpatient flow, clinical workflows, and care progression methodologies.
• Proven ability to lead large-scale operational change and drive performance improvement.
• Demonstrated ability to collaborate effectively with executives, clinicians, and cross-functional stakeholders.

Preferred Qualifications

• Master's degree (MHA, MBA, MSN, MPH or related).
• RN licensure (active or ineligible status) strongly preferred.
• Experience in a centralized command center or real-time health system operations environment.
• Lean Six Sigma Green Belt or Black Belt certification.
• Experience working within multi-state or complex healthcare delivery systems.
• Demonstrated success improving LOS, reducing avoidable days, or optimizing throughput at an enterprise scale.