Health System Specialist - Executive Assistant to the Regional Medical Officer

There are three VISN 4 Health System Specialist vacancies: 1) Health System Specialist to the Regional Medical Officer 4.1; 2) Health System Specialist to the Regional Medical Officer 4.2; and 3) Health System Specialist to the Regional Medical Officer 4.3, providing expert-level analysis and program management across the full scope of the assigned portfolio.

Duties include but are not limited to:

• Serves as the RMO's principal management/administrative advisor and senior action officer for assigned regional and VISN priorities, independently integrating complex clinical, operational, administrative, and performance matters across multiple HSAs and Health Care Systems.
• Leads cross-HSA and cross-facility implementation of assigned RMO initiatives and establishes mechanisms for monitoring performance, implementation reliability, risks, milestones, corrective actions, and outcomes.
• Integrates information and activities across Geriatrics and Extended Care (GEC), Clinical Practice Management, Integrated Clinical Communities, Clinical Resource Hubs, Pharmacy, access, care coordination, and other assigned RMO priorities.
• Ensures that emerging risks, performance concerns, implementation barriers, and matters requiring executive intervention are identified,
  analyzed, and elevated with actionable plans.
• Develops executive-level analyses, decision memoranda, issue papers, dashboards, performance narratives, briefing materials, and recommendations addressing complex or sensitive matters where information may be incomplete, conflicting, rapidly changing, or subject to competing organizational priorities.

Work Schedule: Employees are required to work the regular business hours and applicable core hours of the Health Service Area (HSA) to which they are assigned. Work schedules will be aligned with the time zone(s) served by the assigned HSA and may differ from the employee's local time zone.
Telework: This position may be authorized for ad-hoc telework. Telework eligibility will be discussed during the interview process.
Virtual: This is not a virtual position.
Position Description/PD#: Health System Specialist - Executive Assistant to the Regional Medical Officer/PD0012VS
Relocation/Recruitment Incentives: Not Authorized.
Critical Skills Incentive (CSI): Not Approved.
Permanent Change of Station (PCS): Not Authorized.

To qualify for this position, applicants must meet all requirements by the closing date of this announcement, 10/29/2026.

Time-In-Grade Requirement: Applicants who are current Federal employees and have held a GS grade any time in the past 52 weeks must also meet time-in-grade requirements by the closing date of this announcement. For a GS-14 position you must have served 52 weeks at the GS-13. The grade may have been in any occupation, but must have been held in the Federal service. An SF-50 that shows your time-in-grade eligibility must be submitted with your application materials. If the most recent SF-50 has an effective date within the past year, it may not clearly demonstrate you possess one-year time-in-grade, as required by the announcement. In this instance, you must provide an additional SF-50 that clearly demonstrates one-year time-in-grade. Note: Time-In-Grade requirements also apply to former Federal employees applying for reinstatement as well as current employees applying for Veterans Employment Opportunities Act of 1998 (VEOA) appointment.

Health System Administration Series, 0671 Individual Occupational Requirements

Undergraduate and Graduate Education: Major study -- hospital administration, public health administration, or related fields such as business or public administration with course work in health care administration, ~OR~
Specialized Experience: Progressively responsible analytical or administrative, or clinical management or supervisory experience in the health care field. This work may have been performed in an operating health care facility or a higher organizational echelon with advisory or directional authority over such facilities. Work must have involved a close working relationship with facility managers and analysis and/or coordination of administrative, clinical, or other service activities, and provided knowledge of the following:

• Missions, organizations, programs, and requirements of health care delivery systems;
• Regulations and standards of various regulatory and credentialing groups; and
• Government-wide, agency, and facility systems and requirements in various administrative areas such as budget, personnel, and procurement. ~OR~

Special Provision for Inservice Placement:
Successful completion of an agency-sponsored on-the-job training program may be substituted for qualifying experience, provided it included a formal individualized training plan. Such a training program must have been conducted in an operating health care system and included:

• Assignments providing a knowledge of basic health system administration philosophies, practices, and procedures, and basic government administrative policies and requirements;
• Practical assignments providing an opportunity to apply health system administration skills and principles (as the individual progresses, work assignments must be characteristic of the grade level to which he or she is assigned); and
• Oversight by an experienced health system administrator with periodic evaluation of the individual's progress and appropriate adjustment of the training program.

You may qualify based on your experience as described below:

• Specialized Experience: You must have one year of specialized experience equivalent to at least the next lower grade GS-13 in the normal line of progression for the occupation in the organization. Examples of specialized experience would typically include, but are not limited to:

• Analyze complex health care delivery systems, programs, and operations involving access, staffing, workload, resource utilization, cost, quality, safety, care coordination, and performance outcomes.

• Integrate clinical, administrative, operational, workforce, financial, and performance information across multiple health care organizations or organizational components.

• Advise senior executives and leaders on complex, sensitive, and high-visibility health care management, programmatic, operational, or performance issues.

• Lead the planning and implementation of multi-organizational health care initiatives by developing action plans, milestones, responsibilities, performance measures, governance processes, and follow-up mechanisms.

• Evaluate implementation of policies, standards, strategic priorities, performance-improvement initiatives, readiness requirements, or executive-directed actions; identify risks and barriers; and recommend corrective actions.

• Design or adapt analytical methodologies, data-collection instruments, evaluation criteria, reporting processes, dashboards, or performance-monitoring tools when established methods are inadequate or unavailable.

• Develop executive-level analyses, decision memoranda, issue papers, briefings, reports, recommendations, and other products that translate complex information into actionable decisions.

• Coordinate and negotiate with senior officials and stakeholders who have competing priorities, resources, or organizational responsibilities to resolve implementation barriers and obtain commitments to agreed-upon actions.

Physical Requirements: The work is primarily sedentary. Site visits, meetings, briefings, and oversight activities may require walking, standing, bending, and carrying materials for portions of the workday.

For more information on these qualification standards, please visit the United States Office of Personnel Management's website at https://www.opm.gov/policy-data-oversight/classification-qualifications/general-schedule-qualification-standards/.

There is no educational substitution at this grade level.

A transcript must be submitted with your application if you are basing all or part of your qualifications on 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: http://ope.ed.gov/accreditation/. 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: https://sites.ed.gov/international/recognition-of-foreign-qualifications/.

• You must be a U.S. Citizen to apply for this job
• To be considered for this position, you must complete all required steps in the process. In addition to the application and questionnaire, this position requires an online assessment. The online assessment measures critical general competencies required to perform the job.
• Selective Service Registration is required for males born after 12/31/1959
• Physical Requirements: The work required does not inherently include any physical requirements essential for successful job performance that could not otherwise be performed with accommodation or workplace adjustment. A pre-placement physical examination is not required.
• 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 (https://www.uscis.gov/i-9-central/form-i-9-acceptable-documents). 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.
• Participation in the seasonal influenza vaccination program is a requirement for all Department of Veterans Affairs Health Care Personnel (HCP)

As a condition of employment for accepting this position, you will be required to serve a 1-year probationary period 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 probationary period, your employment will be terminated unless you receive certification, in writing, that your continued employment advances the public interest.