Susan Ellis

IT Strategy and Epic Program Director 15+ years’ success leading the development & implementation of strategic technology initiatives. Visionary with proven capacity for strategy development and transformational change plus a talent for crafting and executing strategic goals designed to enhance organizations and their missions. Leveraging a blend of leadership, operational, and business savvy to champion continuous improvement by delivering high-value projects aligned to objective and key results (OKR). Build, mentor, and lead high-performing teams to embrace challenges, build consensus, and navigate matrixed environments. Demonstrated record of acting as innovative thought leader and business partner to leadership teams. Collaborative communicator able to clearly share information effectively at all organizational levels, while establishing empathetic, fruitful relationships with all stakeholders.

• Epic Roadmaps
• Epic Honor Roll
• Epic Gold Stars
• Epic Implementations & Upgrades
• OKR & KPI Development & Tracking
• Process design & Change Management
• Budget Administration & Management
• Program Evaluation & Development
• Strategic Development and Execution
• Trend and Cost Analyses
• Project Management
• Staff Development & Training
• Risk Identification and Mitigation

• Lean Six Sigma, Green Belt
• Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta Management Certification (2011)

• Grand Central
• Eligibility
• Prelude
• Nurse Triage
• Ambulatory

• Elevance Health, Technology Strategy and Innovation Director | Chief of Staff, Carelon, 02/01/23, Present, Lead strategic technology initiatives to grow the Carelon Technology portfolios of Elevance Health., Chief of Staff to the Staff VP in the Carelon division of Elevance Health leading strategic initiatives that focus on efficiency, achieving Centers of Excellence, portfolio management and reporting., Facilitated strategic planning and decision-making process for Carelon Technology executive team, ensuring alignment with company strategies and objectives., Led strategy in cost and efficiency engagement that pinpointed 25+ million in potential savings opportunities., Successfully implemented and exceeded deadlines for the design of Carelon’s first operating model iteration, resulting in increased efficiency across teams., Prepared detailed reports and presentations evaluating key performance metrics and trends to offer valuable insights for decision-making., Enabled effective communication and collaboration among senior leadership, departments heads and cross functional teams., Recognized as a trusted advisor to the CIO and Staff VP, offering guidance on critical issues, and identifying opportunities for growth and innovation., Aided in the merger and acquisition strategies to streamline the due diligence phase by assessing financial operational risks and identifying value capture opportunities., Implemented and enhanced employee engagement initiatives, resulting in improved team morale., Developed an effective meeting strategy to maximize team productivity and decrease unnecessary meeting time.
• Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta, Information Technology Manager | Optimization and Support, 08/01/21, 02/01/23, Led Epic focused team of nine Clinical Informaticists to perform break fixes, conduct optimization builds, and monitor trending data to support uninterrupted operations of Ambulatory clinics with over seventy-five specialties/subspecialties., Hold concurrent responsibility for leading effort to develop support strategies aligned with department and system goals while coordinating cross-departmental Epic programs and projects, prioritizing activities to reinforce system enterprise., Collaborate with Providers to develop, implement, and analyze KPI for clinic efficiency., Create standard IT and clinical workflows to maintain systems and update technology., Decreased charge control failures in the ambulatory space by implementing negative testing response for all changes, adding peer review to approval process, and creating integrated testing rotation., Increase provider Epic performance by developing metrics that highlight work aligned with strategic goals with high impact on quality metrics for Ambulatory providers and practices., Led Efficiency Committee identifying Epic technology interventions that focus on provider wellness, clinic flow and provider efficiency., Led internal Epic Honor Roll program focusing on Patient Experience, Staying Current and Ease of use for Providers resulting in Honor Roll rating of Summa Cum Laude for 2022 and 2023., Increased telemedicine usage for follow-up visits from by creating formal request process for provider telemedicine participation; increased patient portal adoption enabled telemedicine visits to occur inside the Epic MyChart application and maintain compliance., Led Epic Gold Star program increasing the rating from 5 to 7 in 2021 and maintaining level 7 in 2022., Oversaw the Community Connect team increasing partnerships across the Atlanta community which directly impacted continuity of care and improved health outcomes for patients., Gained buy-in for adoption of technology outside the enterprise by championing and executing a standard vendor team review process., Took part in Agile Methodology committee to ensure the IT department was shifting towards a cross-functional team approach creating greater aptitude for change., Primary Request, Change and Incident champion focused on the Ambulatory Catalog items in ServiceNow., Liaison between Legal, Sourcing and Vendors setting up consolidated terms and agreements creating cost savings for the organization.
• Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta, Epic Applications Analyst Team Lead | IST Business Partnering, 07/01/18, 10/01/21, Led Epic team of eight IST professionals tasked with providing implementation and operational support and technology consults for the organization’s contact center, transplant, and hematology/oncology service lines., Developed and introduced metrics to maintain quality of safe patient care delivery., Reduced clinical errors by creating more efficient nurse and provider workflows., Create safe processes to address regulatory technical fixes for adopted EMR, Epic., Subject matter expert (SME) in the change review process for Epic EMR., SME on Epic EMR applications: Ambulatory, Beacon, Pheonix, Community Connect, Cadence, Eligibility, CRM, Grand Central., Point of escalation for all technology within ambulatory spaces requiring an update, patch, or issue identification and mitigation.
• Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta, Epic Senior Applications Analyst | IST Business Partnering, 06/01/15, 07/01/18, Owned responsibility for guiding system analysis, build, testing, validation, and ongoing support of Epic revenue cycle applications., Synchronized with Patient Access training team to identify and meet organizational needs, evaluate new requests, and accurately communicate information about new build., Coordinated Epic EMR efforts in partnership with new departments, practices, and hospital expansions in role as New Department Committee Chair., SME on Epic technical workflows for access and revenue cycle operations including patient scheduling, coding, insurance, and demographics pre-visit; Implemented Real Time Eligibility (an automatic benefit check for insurance/patient out-of-pocket cost).

Hope and Will Award Winner 2011