top of page

ROSE LAFARGA, CMMP

EXECUTIVE CHIEF OF STAFF | LIFE SCIENCES STRATEGY & OPERATIONS | ENTERPRISE PORTFOLIO GOVERNANCE

Rutherford, NJ | 201-916-2055 | ✉️ rose.lafarga@gmail.com | https://www.linkedin.com/in/rose-lafarga-8262877/

PROFESSIONAL EXPERIENCE

Anchor & Ascent Consulting

July 2025 - Present

Founder & Principal | Fractional COO & Strategy Advisor

​

Serve as fractional Chief of Staff and operating partner to founders and senior leaders across healthcare, life sciences, and digital health organizations, translating strategy into execution and building the operating infrastructure required to scale.  

​

  1. Stand up enterprise operating models including annual planning, OKRs, portfolio governance, and leadership cadences that align priorities and accelerate delivery

  2. Act as executive proxy across product, clinical, engineering, and commercial teams to drive cross functional alignment, decision clarity, and accountability

  3. Drive special initiatives spanning AI enabled modernization, organizational design, and go to market readiness

Takeda Pharmaceuticals

June 2022 – July 2025
Strategy & Ops Head; Chief of Staff to Data Digital Technology CTO & COO ​

​

Chief of Staff to global CTO/COO responsible for enterprise technology, data, and digital innovation across a 4,000+ person organization.

  1. Architected and ran enterprise operating mechanisms including executive governance forums, portfolio reviews, QBRs, and board-facing materials

  2. Served as trusted advisor and proxy for CTO/COO, representing leadership perspective across cross-functional and regional forums

  3. Established enterprise Digital Portfolio Committee managing $52M annual capital investment across 50+ initiatives

  4. Built unified operating system connecting strategy, funding, delivery, and performance across data, digital, AI, and engineering teams

  5. Led GenAI-enabled modernization of Medical–Legal–Regulatory review, reducing cycle time by 30% and improving compliance transparency

  6. Partnered with Finance to modernize budget oversight and forecasting across a $2B global technology budget

  7. Developed 100+ C-suite and board communications annually, including CEO briefs, investment narratives, and strategic updates

  8. Designed executive dashboards and portfolio intelligence using Power BI to provide real-time insight into investment performance and delivery health

The Cigna Group (Cigna Healthcare + Express Scripts PBM) 

Jun 2020 – Jun 2022
Chief of Staff and Director PMO Global Data & Analytics ​

​

Served as Chief of Staff to EVP (x3), leading commercialization strategy for enterprise data products and establishing federated portfolio governance across Cigna Healthcare and Express Scripts subsidiaries.

​

  1. Established Product Execution Office creating enterprise-wide data product portfolio, cataloging and standardizing commercially available data assets across previously siloed business units while maintaining subsidiary autonomy

  2. Built API-enabled data integration infrastructure aggregating and anonymizing individual-level data across healthcare and pharmacy subsidiaries, creating unified member profiles that increased commercial data product value and market competitiveness

  3. Delivered $14M in operational savings and built $100M revenue pipeline through enterprise data unification strategy, enabling scalable commercialization of predictive analytics and commercial intelligence products

  4. Partnered with regional and product leaders to align forecasting, portfolio roadmaps, and go-to-market strategy, translating executive vision into coordinated execution across global data and analytics teams

The Cigna Group (Multiple Leadership Roles)

Mar 2009 – Jun 2020​

​

Progressed through roles of increasing scope and complexity:

​

  1. Director, Northeast Competitive Intelligence - Built market intelligence infrastructure enabling data-driven pricing strategy, network optimization, and risk-informed sales decisions across Northeast region.​

    • Supported competitive mapping down to zip code level, analyzing market share positioning and identifying strategic opportunities for network expansion and member acquisition.

    • Conducted rate benchmarking across regional provider networks, tracking competitor reimbursement strategies and contract renewal cycles to inform pricing timing and competitive positioning

    • Partnered with sales teams to assess policy design impact on network adequacy and pricing competitiveness, delivering predictive risk analysis that balanced market positioning with loss ratio discipline                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                           

  2. Chief of Staff, Healthcare Provider Engagement, Strategic Planning - Led strategic transformation of 320-person provider engagement organization from reactive service model to proactive, data-driven relationship management.

    • Conducted market segmentation analysis across regional geographies to determine optimal engagement model deployment - balancing market share dynamics, competitive positioning, and operational ROI to guide strategic resource allocation

    • Designed and implemented predictive monitoring system tracking provider-level claims denials and prior authorization patterns by geography, triggering proactive account management interventions before provider dissatisfaction escalated

    • Achieved 40% improvement in Net Promoter Score through intelligence-driven engagement strategy; directed enterprise Salesforce CRM rollout enabling real-time market visibility and performance tracking                                                                             

  3. Director, Value-Based Care Operations - Directed multi-year value-based care transformation, scaling operations from $50M to $1B+ in annual provider payments while building and leading teams of 45+ analysts across financial operations and system modernization.

    • Led operational scaling and workforce planning, growing analytics team from 4 to 45 FTEs to support exponential payment volume growth while maintaining contract compliance and payment accuracy across expanding provider network

    • Served as Product Owner for enterprise SaaS platform modernizing value-based payment operations, translating business requirements into automated workflows that replaced manual processes with systematic controls and validation logic

    • Implemented financial controls and eligibility validation frameworks determining patient attribution, funding sufficiency, and payment authorization - ensuring operational discipline and risk mitigation as payment volumes scaled 20x over five years

bottom of page