VP of Operations and VP of Business Development for a New England Pulmonology and Sleep Group

The organization provides services across two distinct healthcare service lines, supporting clinic-based care and hospital-based specialist consultation. Its clinics treat patients with chronic respiratory and sleep conditions across several locations in New Hampshire and Massachusetts. At the same time, the company has consulting contracts with regional hospitals for inpatient and post-acute care.

Each side of the business has its own operating model and needs careful management. The founding doctor had been managing both areas up to this point while continuing his own clinical practice. Both positions were being developed from the ground up as the organization moved to select VP-level leaders for each function. The chosen leaders would assume direct ownership from the founder, so there was no predecessor to provide handover or guidance.

The roles had to be searched together, but they required different profiles. Operations needed a health care administrator who could manage multiple sites and build systems without a blueprint. Business development demanded someone who had personally closed hospital deals and could reference those deals.

Neither seat had a predecessor, so there was no internal benchmark for comparison. Salaries were also not defined, so Keller Executive Search helped to set a range before interviews began. One candidate was ruled out because their long-term ambition didn’t match a company of this size, so the Operations search had to start all over again before the right hire came through.

The work was divided into separate search streams from the start. For Operations, Keller Executive Search looked for healthcare leaders who had managed multiple sites and built functions where there was little structure. Candidate conversations centered on what each person had actually put in place and what the outcome was.

For Business Development, Keller Executive Search focused on candidates with direct hospital service contract wins. The search was lengthy as people with proven hospital contract wins were often working for competitors and were not actively looking. In both searches, candidates were held to a practical standard: they had to provide evidence of their accomplishments.

Both searches closed in the same cycle. The VP of Operations was confirmed for a start in September. The founding physician handed over two functions he had been running personally and regained time. The company secured VP-level leadership in two functions that previously had none.