Sally Jo Kucharczyk

About Sally Jo Kucharczyk

Executive leader with 25+ years of experience in healthcare strategy, absence management, and claims operations across Fortune 50 corporations, major health systems, and national TPAs. Expertise: Workers’ Compensation, FMLA, ADA, STD, LTD, Disability Pensions, and occupational health program management. Successful vendor management, KPI alignment, PG management, and RFP management. Skilled in medical care plan designs both occupational and personal. Current: Lead clinical innovation for a Fortune 50 organization; oversee a nationwide occupational health and wellness program with 150+ clinicians/Athletic Trainers. Built non-adversarial injury care models, Age of Injury protocols, and early diagnostic imaging to compress claims and increase closures while supporting employee wellbeing.$41M in vendor contract management and RFP project leadership.Core strengths: Vendor management (RFP/KPI/SLAs/ROI), OSHA compliance, return-to-work, predictive analytics, cross-functional partnership (EHS, Benefits COE, HR, Legal, Finance), and multi-state program leadership.Committed to advancing non-adversarial processes in claims operations, excellence in product delivery, driving productivity, resilience, and measurable value. Delivered significant reductions in pending claims and risk liabilities through strategic process redesign, vendor governance in end-to-end insurance programing.

Experience

1. Manager, HR Operations, Managed Care and Clinical Operations

   PepsiCo

   Mar 2024 — Present

   Integrate Claims & Clinical: Build bridges between EHS, Benefits COE, HR, Legal, and clinical vendors. Management of 150 on-site clinical providers including Athletic Trainers, Nurse Practitioners, and Physician Assistants, Standardize Protocols: Set uniform policies for reporting, referrals, diagnostics, and documentation.Innovation: Designed, manage, implemented and measured the nationwide Age of injury program,Accelerate Diagnostics: Use Age of Injury frameworks and early imaging to shorten time to appropriate care.Govern Vendors: Implement RFPs, KPIs, SLAs, and ROI tracking; conduct audits and tail reviews.Apply Analytics: Predict risk, prioritize cases, and guide resource investment.Educate Leaders: Train managers and supervisors on investigations, documentation, and return-to-work standards.Measure What Matters: Track closure rate, lag times, medical utilization, indemnity days, OSHA recordability, and litigation incidence.Communicate Clearly: Provide employees and stakeholders with transparent, timely information; reduce friction and error.The outcomes—compressed claims cycles, higher closure rates, reduced risk liabilities, and cost containment—are not isolated wins; they are the predictable outputs of a disciplined, clinical-claims operating model.

Education

• Ferris State University

  Insurance Mgt & Risk Mgt, Actuarial Science

Skills

• Training
• Leave of Absence Management
• Claim
• Short Term Disability
• Dol Defense
• Workers Compensation
• Human Resources
• Strategic Human Resources Leadership
• Strategic Planning
• Disability Insurance
• Workers Compensation Defense
• Human Resource Development
• Employee Benefits
• Risk Management
• Organizational Development
• Staffing Analysis
• Claims Management
• Management
• Personnel Management
• Succession Planning
• Employment Practices Liability
• Benefits Administration
• Payroll
• Healthcare Management
• Insurance
• Disabilities
• Hris
• Recruiting
• Fmla
• Human Resources Development