University of California, Office of the President - Associate Vice President & Chief Risk Officer

The University of California (UC) is the world’s leading public research university system. With 10 campuses, 6 health systems (including 5 academic medical centers), 3 national labs, and a network of agricultural and natural research centers, the UC system includes 295,000+ students and 227,000+ faculty and staff, with 2 million alumni living all around the world. The only world-class public research university for, by, and of California, UC is committed to fostering innovation, championing sustainability, being a model for educational opportunity, and providing needed public services and spaces to California.

The Office of the President is the system-wide headquarters of the University, managing its fiscal and business operations, and furthering its public interest, academic, and research missions. It supports campuses and students through system-wide funding and programs; manages the University’s multi-billion-dollar operations and investments; oversees medical centers and national labs; provides centralized labor relations and legal services; and promotes the well-being of its diverse and large workforce through benefits and retirement programs. The Office of the President coordinates activities that allow a complex and unique system to operate efficiently as one university, overseeing and managing programs that serve the entire system, and enabling campuses to capture the savings and efficiencies that come from centralized operations.

Reporting directly to the Chief Financial Officer, the Associate Vice President and Chief Risk Officer (CRO) applies the principles of informed risk evaluation in leading the Office of Risk Services, serving senior leadership, academic, and administrative units across the University. The CRO provides strategic leadership and vision across UC’s ten campuses to reduce the chances of loss, create greater financial stability, and protect resources in support of UC's mission.

The CRO provides oversight for Enterprise Risk Management, Environment, Health & Safety, Emergency Management, Mission Continuity, Behavioral Threat Assessment, and the Risk Technology online platform, financed through UC’s multiple captive insurance companies. The work of the University is complex and varied and the Office of Risk Services, with a $700 million budget and a highly skilled full-time staff of 43, manages 45 lines of insurance coverage. The CRO heads this center of excellence and its role in leading and rendering advice, planning, and counsel on risk-related issues. The Office evaluates operations and exposures to render timely, incisive organizational planning to influence appropriate change that mitigates and manages risk, encourages loss prevention, determines area-specific self-insurance limits, reduces cost, improves safety, and advances other University objectives across the UC system.

A leader with keen business acumen and a wise and experienced risk-taker, the next CRO will have a record of leadership of an extensive and multi-structured risk management program for a large institution with diverse operations and exposures, ideally in higher education. In the context of a hardening trend in insurance markets accelerated by the global pandemic, the CRO will foster new ways of thinking and funding risk, impelling creative transformations and strategies of mitigation and coverage that together deliver the desired business outcomes. The CRO will exercise a deep familiarity with the practice and tools of insurance and liability, compliance standards, loss-prevention strategies, risk analysis and metrics, and capital management

A sterling communicator, champion of diversity, equity, and inclusion, and empowering leader with well-developed general management skills, the CRO will motivate excellence and build trusting and effective working relationships at all levels and across all departments and all campuses. Intellectually curious, mission-driven, and passionate about a secure future for one of the world’s greatest university systems, this leader will have both breadth and depth of vision, and a vital awareness that details make up the whole.

Review of candidate materials will begin immediately (in July 2022) and the ability to apply or nominate will continue until the position has been filled. The complete position profile and application information can be found at: caldwell.thriveapp.ly/job/1024. The University of California has retained Caldwell Partners, a national executive search firm, to assist with this search. 

Please email confidential inquiries, nominations, or referrals to: UCOPAVPCRO@caldwell.com

The University’s vaccination policy can be found here: policy.ucop.edu/SARS-CoV-2_Covid-19

The University of California is an Equal Opportunity/Affirmative Action Employer advancing inclusive excellence. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, disability, age or protected veteran status, or other protected categories covered by the UC nondiscrimination policy. The complete University of California nondiscrimination and affirmative action policy can be found at:

https://policy.ucop.edu/doc/4000376/DiscHarassAffirmAction

The University of California, Office of the President, strives to make position postings accessible to any and all users. If you have comments regarding the accessibility of UC’s website or need assistance completing the application process, please contact: Accessibility or email the Human Resource Department at epost@ucop.edu.