The Director, Leadership Effectiveness serves as a senior internal consultant and practitioner within the Leadership Academy, partnering with leaders and teams to strengthen leadership effectiveness across St. Jude.
The Director leads a portfolio of complex leadership and organizational-effectiveness initiatives, from diagnosis and design through implementation, evaluation, and sustained adoption. The role combines expertise in organizational development, behavioral science, human-centered design, and organizational change to strengthen leadership capability and address the conditions that shape leadership in practice.
Working across organizational boundaries, the Director translates St. Jude’s leadership expectations into practical approaches that improve how leaders and teams operate. The role partners closely with HR Leadership Development, Culture Strategy, Academy Operations, and other institutional functions to align interventions with institutional priorities and deliver measurable results.
Director, Leadership Effectiveness
Job Descriptions:
Serve as a trusted advisor to senior leaders on complex leadership, team, and organizational-effectiveness challenges.
Lead a portfolio of leadership-effectiveness initiatives, defining objectives, scope, implementation plans, resource needs, and measures of success.
Manage and develop Academy staff through clear goal setting, performance management, coaching, and ongoing feedback, supporting engagement and career development in alignment with Academy priorities.
Diagnose challenges by distinguishing among individual capability, team dynamics, organizational conditions, and broader systemic factors.
Conduct stakeholder research, interviews, observation, and analysis of qualitative and quantitative evidence to identify needs and patterns across the institution.
Design and lead interventions that strengthen leadership effectiveness, team performance, decision-making, collaboration, and organizational performance.
Translate Leading the St. Jude Way, the Culture Principles, and leadership capabilities into practical behaviors, tools, experiences, and ways of working.
Apply organizational development, systems thinking, behavioral science, and human-centered design to develop evidence-informed solutions.
Design, prototype, test, and refine interventions; guide implementation and establish approaches that support sustained adoption.
Define and evaluate intervention outcomes in partnership with the SVP and Academy Operations, using findings to improve approaches and inform decisions about broader implementation.
Facilitate senior leadership teams through complex conversations, problem-solving, reflection, and decision-making.
Advise leaders navigating organizational change, addressing the leadership behaviors, team practices, and organizational conditions required for successful implementation.
Lead cross-functional and matrixed teams, aligning stakeholders, clarifying responsibilities, and securing executive sponsorship for assigned initiatives.
Partner with HR Leadership Development to determine when formal learning is an appropriate response and shape solutions accordingly.
Partner with Culture Strategy where leadership behavior intersects with broader culture priorities, maintaining clear roles and coordinated action.
Direct the work of external coaches, facilitators, consultants, and other practitioners supporting assigned initiatives, establishing expectations and evaluating quality and effectiveness.
Partner with Academy Operations on initiative budgets, resource allocation, contracting, and delivery planning.
Advise the SVP on emerging leadership needs, systemic barriers, intervention priorities, and opportunities for institutional impact.
Communicate insights, recommendations, progress, and outcomes clearly to senior leaders and institutional partners.
Remain directly involved in consulting, design, facilitation, and implementation, consistent with the Academy’s small-team…