Overview: Departmental Strategic Planning

For the first time in several years, our Department assembled on Saturday, March 7, 2015, for a strategic planning session. This retreat was well attended, with over 60 participants including faculty, residents and administrative staff, as well as non-surgical Jefferson representatives. Many of our departmental leaders spoke on topics varying from our Vision and Mission statements, to the University’s Blueprint for Strategic Action, business development, clinical topics, educational topics, quality and outcome issues, financial considerations, patient and staff satisfaction, and the research agenda. We also discussed philanthropy, faculty development and the current political/healthcare climate. The feedback from the Retreat was very positive. Our thanks go out to our facilitator Barbara Eiser, MA, MCP, PCC, President of Leading Impact, Inc., who helped organize and nucleate this Retreat. Now comes the real work! We have generated action items in several areas, including: clinical research, faculty mentoring and development, undergraduate medical education, graduate medical education, clinical program growth, and expansion of technology and services. Efforts are being made to align our departmental strategies with the One Jefferson institutional strategy. Various ad hoc subcommittees have been formed, and work continues on better defining our priorities and goals. In several areas there is low hanging fruit that we will be able to easily achieve. In other areas, we have aspirational goals that will hopefully be enabled by philanthropy and faculty involvement. These are exciting times at Jefferson and for our Department of Surgery. Stay tuned for further developments, new initiatives and enhancements of our clinical research infrastructure, progress in faculty mentoring and development and, of course, improvements in technology to benefit our patients, learners, and faculty. Exciting times! More to come