This position serves as a principal advisor and action officer for region-wide initiatives, operational issues, and cross facility coordination efforts, and functions as a critical extension of the RQO in managing the regions programmatic and administrative workload. The incumbent provides expert program management, analysis, executive coordination, and action-officer support for complex, high-visibility, and sensitive VISN priorities.
Duties include but are not limited to:

• Coordinates with VISN leaders and Health Care System executives to translate VISN priorities into operationally feasible actions; monitors implementation, variation, risk, and outcomes across and within HSAs; and elevates matters requiring VISN executive attention or governance action
• Develops executive dashboards, performance narratives, issue papers, briefing materials, decision memoranda, talking points, and recommendations that accurately frame issues
• Tracks milestones, accountable officials, dependencies, evidence of completion, measures of success, and unresolved barriers
• Integrates the RQO portfolio into related HSA priorities, such as quality, safety, access, and care coordination
• Analyzes interdependencies among clinical, administrative, operational, workforce, financial, technological, logistical, quality, and performance factors across and withinHealth Care Systems
• Independently plans and leads complex, broad-scale studies, program evaluations, special projects, and management analyses
• Reviews proposed policies, procedures, organizational changes, performance targets, and resource decisions for operational feasibility, implementation risk, portfolio impact, and alignment with VHA and HSA priorities
• Manage executive workflow for the assigned office, including correspondence, suspense tracking, agenda development, briefing preparation, meeting support, records of decisions, action-item monitoring, and follow-up
• Establishes and maintains communication channels that enable timely issue escalation, information exchange, coordinated implementation, and alignment among VISN leadership, HSA leaders, and Health Care Systems

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.
Position Description/PD#: Health System Specialist-Executive Assistant to the Regional Quality Officer/PD0013VS
Relocation/Recruitment Incentives: Not Authorized
Critical Skills Incentive (CSI): Not Approved
Permanent Change of Station (PCS): Not Approved

Conditions of employment

• 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.

Qualifications

To qualify for this position, applicants must meet all requirements by the closing date of this announcement, 10/28/2026.

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.

You may qualify based on your experience and/or education as described below: The Individual Occupational Requirements must be met.

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.

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.

In addition to meeting the required Individual Occupational Requirement (IOR) above, applicants must meet the specialized experience below:

GS-14
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 the following:

• Ability to analyze, interpret, and resolve complex, interrelated, and high-impact issues across multiple HSAs and Health Care Systems;
• Knowledge of VHA organizational relationships and governance, including the respective roles of VHA Central Office, Operations Centers, VISNs, HSAs, Health Care Systems, and affiliated or associated care-delivery partners;
• Experience to apply knowledge to coordinated VISN-level implementation while preserving HSA coordination and delivery-model responsibilities and Health Care System accountability for direct patient care and local operations;
• Mastery of oral and written communication, facilitation, and relationship-management skills sufficient to advise senior executives, obtain cooperation among officials with differing priorities and represent the Executive within delegated authority, and prepare clear, persuasive, executive-level products on complex or sensitive matters.

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/.