Objective

Health Plan of San Mateo’s Internship/Fellowship Program supports the recruitment, skill development, career growth, and retention of emerging managed care leaders by fostering a positive work environment with thoughtful and dedicated mentorship. The Internship/Fellowship Program is a paid opportunity to contribute meaningfully to HPSM’s organizational focus areas.

Internship/Fellowship Scope

This opportunity will provide the intern/fellow with:

• Knowledge and experience in the operation of a non-profit community-based health plan.
• Knowledge and experience in the development of programs and services that benefit our diverse membership.
• Professional experience working on a specific project important to HPSM and a chance to present recommendations through a final paper and/or presentation to HPSM leadership.

Internship Logistics

·    Start date: June 16, 2025 (flexible based on applicant schedule)

• Work Type: Remote work with in-person opportunities at South San Francisco office. Applicants must have a California residence.

Required Skills & Knowledge

These are the qualifications typically needed to succeed in this position. However, you do not need to meet every requirement to apply.

• Currently enrolled or recent graduate of an undergraduate or graduate degree program in public health, public policy, business administration, social work, social sciences, communications, or related disciplines. Minimum 3.0 GPA.
• Basic understanding of the fundamentals of health care and the health care system.
• Solid written and verbal communication skills.
• Proficiency with Microsoft Office (Word, Excel, Outlook, and PowerPoint)

List of Projects

Working collaboratively with the HPSM sponsor, the intern or fellow will be provided the opportunity to work on one of the following projects during the internship or fellowship.

Projects Description

1.      Government Affairs Fellow

HPSM’s Government Affairs team is seeking a fellow who will help develop a government affairs/strategic engagement plan by researching practices of other LHPC (Local Health Plans of California) and ACAP (Association for Community Affiliated Plans) organizations, conducting interviews of leadership at HPSM and potentially other plans for research. This fellow will make a series of recommendations on what activities or actions may be beneficial to HPSM based on HPSM's goals, mission, vision, including but not limited to engaging with legislative contacts, regulatory agency contacts, and public affairs.

2.      Provider Services Fellow

HPSM’s Provider Services Department is responsible for a breadth of activities that allow us to maintain a network of skilled, culturally competent health care professionals who provide high-quality services to our diverse membership. This fellow will analyze data on Out of Network provider utilization, identify and prioritize opportunities for network growth. This fellow would work on analyzing HPSM’s Out of Network claims data, and identifying trends in possible areas of network need based on provider type, region, and other access related factors. Based on these findings as well as other network factors, the fellow will be asked to identify and prioritize a list of 10-15 providers from the list for future network outreach, prioritize them, and explain why they are being prioritized over others. Additionally, researching those services that are low utilization but have a high impact on our members, that may not necessarily appear at the top of our report. The final deliverable(s) will be a presentation with key takeaways from data analysis and a recommended list of providers to prioritize for outreach.

3.      Health Services Fellow: Primary Care Investments

HPSM’s Health Services department is seeking a fellow to analyze the current state of primary care in our markets and leverage learnings to identify opportunities for innovation and transformation. This fellow will conduct research, synthesize the data and develop strategic recommendations on one of our investment goals. Collaborate cross-functionally with clinical, operational, and business leaders around existing implementation plans. Support evaluation efforts and identify storytelling opportunities to share our work-in-progress. Share insights and proposals through presentations to executive stakeholders. The key deliverables for this fellow are to assist with the discovery of a specific problem, to synthesize the results, and report out on them to inform next steps.

4.      Finance Fellow

HPSM’s Finance team is seeking a fellow to build out centralized processes for the work needed for HPSM to manage all of the different types of directed payment mechanisms and processes used by DHCS (Department of Health Care Services).The fellow would learn about Medicaid payment strategies, health plan data sources (claims and encounters), and cross-functional business processes while helping to build the management processes needed to support the plan's increasing responsibilities to administer directed payments on behalf of the state.

5.     Finance Intern: Encounter Data

HPSM’s Finance team is seeking an intern who will learn about the connections between the health plan's encounter data and rate reporting data sources and conducting gap analyses on specific data sets. The intern will also develop a project plan for HPSM to develop a "mirror" internal report for management purposes and understand the DHCS (Department of Health Care Services) "Stoplight" reports. In both instances, the intern will learn about the health plan's data sources, internal and external reporting processes, how to evaluate reporting logic decision-making, and principles of data gap analyses.

6.  Population Health Fellow

HPSM’s Population Health Department is seeking a fellow to develop a member outreach strategy informed by various member experience survey results to help HPSM address members’ needs, improve satisfaction, and build trust. This project aims to design and implement a structured outreach process to engage health plan members based on insights from member experience surveys. By establishing standardized procedures and tools, the initiative seeks to enhance member satisfaction, identify and address key pain points, and foster stronger member relationships. This process will ensure consistent and effective communication, making it easier for health plan teams to follow up meaningfully with members.

7.     Learning and Development Fellow

HPSM’s Learning and Development team equips employees and providers with the resources, training, and growth opportunities to better serve our diverse member population. This fellow will be focused on supporting the design and execution of the pilot cohort of HPSM's new leadership development program (People Leaders Learning Program). Employee-facing deliverables include creating a site/workspace for sharing resources and virtual collaboration, developing participant materials (e.g., worksheets, learner guides, slide decks, posters), curating a library of high-quality resources related to the topics in the program and supporting the production and facilitation of the live sessions.

8.      Learning and Development Intern

HPSM's Learning and Development department is seeing an intern to support the design/redesign of compliance related trainings to incorporate gamification and content chunking throughout the year to improve effectiveness and reduce cognitive load.

9.      IT Operations Intern

HPSM’s IT Department maintains the technical backbone of the organization's operations, including managing a complex portfolio of systems and applications. The IT Operations department is a skilled and

high-performing team who meet the needs of a largely remote workforce. As part of this project, the intern will gain experience with knowledgebase documentation management, E-Waste/inventory management, internal help desk and incident management operations, and license management. This internship is a good fit for people interested in IT operations, system administration or security and gaining exposure to the unique demands of IT in a healthcare environment.