Healthcare Attorney
The Company
The Company is a leader in the rapidly growing family-building space. We provide a broad range of administrative, clinical-management, provider-network and claims services to support infertility, surrogacy, adoption, fertility-preservation, healthcare travel and related benefits offered by insurers, managed care organizations, and self-funded ERISA plans, as well as products that provide guidance, and arrange discounts on medical care and drugs and treatment financing, to support direct-pay infertility patients.
The Company prides itself in offering a dedicated team of specialized infertility nurses, behavioral counselors and dieticians, to provide individuals, couples and families a wide range of care navigation and support. We are dedicated to assisting patients, intended parents and their families throughout their entire family-building journey. We operate through an entrepreneurial culture dedicated to providing rapid, innovative responses to meet the needs of customers, patients and intended parents. As such, the successful team mate is one who works both independently and collaboratively, applying their subject matter expertise to help adapt, improve and innovate the Company's products and services, assure our regulatory and contractual compliance, and help drive sales through deal structuring and negotiating customer contracts.
THE ROLE
We are currently looking for a healthcare attorney to support our legal and regulatory needs during projected rapid growth of our domestic and international business. Reporting to the Chief Executive Officer, this attorney will from the outset be part of the Company's senior executive team, working with the Company's senior business, finance, commercial, operations, information and clinical executives. The successful candidate will have sufficient experience and skills to immediately take on critical assignments, and to develop within 2 to 5 years into the Company's first General Counsel.
The successful candidate will initially be charged with leading the Company's compliance and regulatory needs, with a particular emphasis on securing and maintaining state licenses required for our health benefit management products. Experience with international business issues and license requirements is not required, but would be a plus.
While leading the regulator efforts, the attorney will start to become intimately acquainted with the Company's business, customers, and the legal and regulatory framework in which it operates. The attorney will have the opportunity to work closely with the senior outside counsel who has for many years handled the Company's customer contracts, to learn the Company's contractual and business relationships. Over time, the attorney will manage the transition of the contracting work to in-house staff, and will assume the full functions of the General Counsel role, including building and managing the legal and compliance teams; providing advice and guidance to the Company's executives on business, strategic and legal matters; selecting and supervising outside counsel; and advising the governing body as appropriate.
Initial Responsibilities
- Obtain and retain healthcare licenses required for the Company's domestic business, including third party administer, utilization reviewer, preferred provider network and related licenses from all applicable states. In this role, the attorney will
- supervise WIN's non-lawyer licensing team, including providing staffing recommendations
- personally engage with regulators and/or local counsel to successfully complete applications and obtain/retain licenses
- Provide advice to our senior executives and our teams on regarding regulatory requirements and risk mitigation, and manage the Company's adherence to all local and national regulatory obligations and requirements
- Work with outside counsel to provide guidance to management on international business requirements, including licenses and regulatory requirements.
- Provide other legal services, as requested, in support of the Company's business, including addressing patient-care questions, insurance and ERISA compliance issues, and product-development matters, as well as general business, employment and real-estate issues. In this role, the attorney will interface with executives and outside counsel as appropriate.
- Work closely and frequently with all teams across the company as well as the CEO, Chief Commercial Officer, Chief Financial Officer and VP of Finance, Chief Information Officer, and dedicated outside Contracts Counsel, as necessary to learn the Company's business and customers, and the legal/regulatory environment in which the Company operates, in the shortest reasonable learning curve.
Developing Responsibilities. The attorney will assume additional responsibilities, ultimately becoming the Company's first General Counsel, based on the progression of their learning curve.
- Serve as the first point of contact for legal matters, advising on whether matters should be addressed in-house or by outside counsel
- Serve as the subject matter expert and legal resource for the Company, including staying current on changes in healthcare, insurance, benefits and other laws and regulations applicable to governing family-building benefit management.
- Supervise legal, compliance and audit (internal and customer-facing) departments, including analysis of existing staff and advice on appropriate staffing, and overseeing the development policies and procedures across the organization.
- In-house the legal support for commercial contracting.
- Draft, review and negotiate customer contracts.
- Support sales and operational teams with structuring risk-appropriate and business-friendly relationships with vendors, clients, and others involved in healthcare transactions
- Assist in drafting and reviewing external communications to assure message clarity and minimize legal and reputational risks.
Requirements
- 5+ years of legal practice with at least 3 years dedicated to healthcare law.
- Experience with healthcare regulatory issues and dealing with regulators, including knowledge of healthcare and insurance licenses
- Exceptional writing/communication and editing skills
- Ability to explain complex matters to executives in clear, concise memoranda
- Ability to draft customer communications
- Ability to draft responses to RFIs and RFPs
- Ability to improve drafts prepared by others
- Strongest consideration will be given to candidates who demonstrates one or more of the following:
- Leadership experience
- Managed care experience
- Experience with drafting and negotiating contracts
- Experience representing or working in-house for healthcare management companies, insurers or providers
- Experience with data security and IT issues
- Professional demeanor
- Highly organized and detail oriented
- Poised under pressure
- Team player, whose skill and knowledge gains the confidence of the executive team.
- Strives for excellence and knows that there is always room to do better
- Motivated by the prospect of making a difference to the success of the Company every day
- Adept at managing multiple projects (both internal and external) simultaneously in a fast-paced environment
- Juris Doctor degree and licensed in good standing in at least one State, US Territory or the District of Columbia. If not licensed in the Company's home state, willing to obtain such license (including taking bar exam if waiver not available) as quickly as practicable.