Medical Director / CMO, FQHC
Healthcare Headhunters recruits healthcare professionals for employers. No upfront fee. You pay only if you hire.
This is what we do all day: recruit healthcare professionals.
Hire an FQHC Medical Director who can keep a patient panel, guide providers, and act on quality findings.
No postings. No stacks of resumes. No chasing. You interview a short list.
No upfront fee. You pay only if you hire.
Need someone now? Call 305-306-4829.
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What happens next
- We review your role, responsibilities and location.
- Ivan or a senior team member will reach out soon.
- You meet a focused shortlist when qualified candidates fit the agreed search.
- Fees.
- No upfront fee. Pay only if you hire, under the signed agreement.
- Exclusivity.
- Set out in the signed client agreement.
- Confidentiality.
- We agree the brief before outreach. This is not a promise of absolute anonymity.
- No hire.
- No hire means no fee on standard searches.
What does an open seat cost you every week?
An open role costs you more than the recruiting fee. Someone covers the work, waits for care, or stops a service. We ask what is falling behind and who is carrying it. Use your own figures to compare the cost of waiting with the cost of hiring.
The seat is costing you every week.
Overtime, diverted patients, a stretched team and a schedule held together by favors.
The posting brought the wrong people.
Applicants arrive, but the person who has done this exact work is employed and not looking.
You are the one chasing.
Screening calls, no-shows and follow-ups land on the desk of someone with a facility to run.
What does this hire really come down to?
Your Medical Director or CMO needs time for visits, inbox decisions, chart review, provider coaching, quality meetings, and federal reporting. We help you define that weekly split before we approach physicians, so candidates can judge the actual work rather than a title.
An internal promotion may suit a physician who already reviews peer work, coaches colleagues, and knows your reporting duties. An outside hire may fit when your team needs experience supervising several providers, responding to audit findings, or working with Uniform Data System reporting. We ask what decisions the physician owned, which measures they reviewed, and what changed afterward.
The Medical Director works alongside the Practice Administrator. The physician may set clinical protocols, review clinical concerns, and guide provider practice. The administrator may own budgets, schedules, and nonclinical staffing. We ask how a candidate handled a clinical request with a cost impact, who made the final decision, and how the answer reached the provider team.
What do we check before you see anyone?
Confirm an active physician license in your state. We screen board certification status, state medical board standing, and disclosed history for your credentialing team to review. Discuss the candidate’s patient panel. We ask about visits, inbox messages, refills, referrals, and what leadership work moved when clinical demand increased.
- Review supervision of physicians, nurse practitioners, and physician assistants. We ask how the candidate addressed recurring note, referral, or follow-up concerns and checked later work.
- Test quality-improvement judgment. Candidates should describe a dashboard measure, the practice pattern behind it, the change they introduced, and any added charting burden.
- Ask about federal audits and primary care standards. We separate participation in an audit from personal responsibility for records, reports, corrective actions, or provider education.
- Examine peer-review work. We ask how the physician distinguishes an isolated documentation lapse from a pattern, delivers feedback, and escalates a concern when coaching does not resolve it.
Where do we find them, and why would they move?
Many physicians in this pool work in multi-site community health systems, large primary care clinics, or similar organizations with provider oversight duties. Some moved from full-time practice into lead roles while retaining a patient panel. We look for work that matches your center’s supervision and reporting scope.
A physician may consider a move after taking responsibility for clinical performance without authority to change protocols or provider education. Others want a defined leadership role while continuing patient care. We ask what they would leave, what authority they expect, and whether your opening offers that scope.
Which mistakes stall the search?
A common mistake is selecting the strongest individual clinician without asking how they corrected another provider’s documentation, referral pattern, or follow-up process. Another is leaving patient-care time undefined, then adding peer review, meetings, reporting, and coaching around a full panel.
Interviewing the physician apart from the Practice Administrator, then finding different views on budgets, schedules, and clinical authority after the offer.
How would we run the search for this opening?
List patient sessions, leadership meetings, chart review, provider supervision, quality work, and reporting duties. We screen credentials, work history, board status, licensure, and fit. Bring clinical and administrative leaders into the finalist meeting. Identify what can move during absences or unusually heavy clinic demand.
Set the weekly work split
Candidates need a real view of the tradeoffs.
Screen the leadership record
We ask about a quality finding, audit response, difficult provider conversation, and clinical decision with a financial effect.
Run a joint final interview
If you present a hypothetical protocol change that adds cost and affects coverage, ask who decides, who is consulted, and how the decision is carried into daily practice.
The role and the setting
Not ready to start a search?
Get a free talent snapshot
We tell you where qualified Medical Director (Practice, Clinic, Region) are working in your area and what it takes to move them. No fee. No obligation.
Get a free job description review
Paste or upload the JD. We flag unclear scope, requirements and terms that may put strong candidates off. No fee. No obligation.
What should we do if a finalist requests more compensation near the offer stage?
Review what changed and whether the role carries duties not defined at the start, such as a larger panel or broader provider supervision. We can discuss market context with both sides. No upfront fee. You pay only if you hire.
How long does an FQHC Medical Director or CMO search take?
The timeline depends on location, compensation, patient-care expectations, and the federal reporting experience you seek. We test those points early instead of presenting physicians whose leadership background does not match the job.
How can we reduce the chance of a counteroffer changing the decision?
Ask early why the physician is considering a move and what authority, patient-care mix, and leadership scope they want. If a current employer offers more pay without changing those conditions, the physician can weigh the full decision.
How do we assess fit with our leadership team?
Use a structured meeting with providers and the Practice Administrator. Ask the candidate to address a hypothetical dispute over a clinical protocol that adds cost, then listen for how they gather input, make the clinical call, and communicate the outcome.
Do you employ, insure, or provide benefits for the physician we hire?
No: you hire the physician directly as an employee or contractor under your own arrangements. Written agreements set fee and replacement terms for standard searches. We arrange locum tenens, travel and contract coverage on request.
What should you send us about this role?
Send us the role, where the person will work and what needs to change with this hire. We will ask about the work, not just the title. Share any license or schedule limits that could rule someone out before we begin the search.
Tell us how your Medical Director’s week should be divided between patient care and leadership. We will build the search around the work your center needs completed.
No upfront fee. You pay only if you hire. We offer a candidate replacement guarantee on standard search agreements. The applicable period and exact terms are set out in the signed client recruiting agreement.
What happens next
- We review your role, responsibilities and location.
- Ivan or a senior team member will reach out soon.
- You meet a focused shortlist when qualified candidates fit the agreed search.
- Fees.
- No upfront fee. Pay only if you hire, under the signed agreement.
- Exclusivity.
- Set out in the signed client agreement.
- Confidentiality.
- We agree the brief before outreach. This is not a promise of absolute anonymity.
- No hire.
- No hire means no fee on standard searches.
What do you get at each step of the search?
Our process for every search: calibrate the seat with you, map the market, research the real people, reach out to each one personally, qualify them in live conversation, then hand you a short list with a written brief on each person and support through the offer.
Search Calibration
You get an agreed brief: the work, reporting line, credentials, schedule, and offer you can make.
Market Mapping
You get a search aimed at relevant backgrounds, including people working now who have not applied.
Professional Contact Intelligence
We check appropriate ways to reach the people identified for your search. You do not have to chase them yourself.
Persistent Personalized Outreach
We explain your actual job and follow up with people who may consider a conversation.
Live Candidate Qualification
You see people we have spoken with about the work, interest, and practical fit, not an unread resume pile.
Candidate Intelligence and Process Support
You get a written brief and support through interviews and offer discussions. You make the hiring decision.
What are the replacement terms?
We offer a candidate replacement guarantee on standard search agreements. The applicable period and exact terms are set out in the signed client recruiting agreement. Ask us to walk through those terms before you sign, so you know how a replacement would work for your opening and who would start it.
What do we not do in a standard permanent search?
We do not bill standard contingency search by the hour or simply repost your job. Temporary coverage is a separate arrangement. Any retainer or different engagement must be agreed, not assumed. Tell us early if you need coverage while the permanent search runs.