OHSU

Paths To Leadership

A School of Medicine Program for Developing Faculty Leaders

Paths to Leadership (PTL) is a School of Medicine program designed to provide emerging faculty leaders with the knowledge and skills to be effective leaders and managers. The learning is built around a project conducted by the participants themselves that will deliver real value both to the participants and to OHSU. This program is offered by the OHSU Division of Management under the sponsorship of the School of Medicine. 

Who is this intended for?

Paths to Leadership is intended for School of Medicine faculty who are taking on early or mid-stage leadership roles within their departments, divisions, or elsewhere in the School of Medicine or OHSU. Individuals who are considering taking on such roles or wish to develop their individual leadership skills are also eligible although preference will be given to individuals who already have some leadership responsibility—e.g., course directors, residency directors, medical directors, division chiefs, vice chairs, etc.

What are the benefits?

Participants will benefit through:

  • New concepts, insights and perspectives leading to solutions for current issues
  • Learning that adapts to their daily reality
  • A deeper understanding of OHSU and the School of Medicine
  • Having greater personal impact in promoting change or new initiatives
  • A trusted group of colleagues and peers 

OHSU will benefit by:

  • Improving its leadership and management capacity
  • Leveraging participants' experience to address organizational issues
  • Promoting a learning culture
  • Developing and sustaining champions for change

Learning Overview

Paths to Leadership is organized around five learning themes:

  • Growing self and broadening perspectives.  Building on strengths, design thinking.
  • Understanding the environment.  Understanding systems and complexity; organizations and silos; OHSU and its role in the American healthcare system; understanding OHSU's financial drivers.
  • Leading organizations.  Managing projects, improving processes, building a business case; problem solving and decision making.
  • Building collaborations.  Collaboration and community; building effective teams.
  • Leading change.  Using conscious influence; building your political coalition.

Learning Modality

Learning will occur via content delivery sessions and a "learn-by-doing" application project. The content sessions will be sequenced to provide just-in-time learning for the application project.

  • Content sessions
    These sessions will be 90 minutes in duration and will focus on the learning themes identified above as well as on the knowledge, skills, and tools that will be needed in the application project—specifically, fundamentals and tools for managing projects; understanding and improving processes; building a business case, understanding OHSU finances. The 2012 schedule is currently in development but will be similar to the 2011 schedule

  • Application project
    The goal of the application project is to provide a learn-by-doing experience that creates value both for the participants and OHSU. Participants will work in teams of 2-5 on a particular project throughout the duration of the program. The principal criteria for the projects are that it will be a valuable learning experience for participants and that it will add value to OHSU.

2010 Projects

  • System Approaches to Quality at OHSU
  • Building a Financially Stable Model for Continuing Medical Education at OHSU

 

2011 Projects

  • Integrating Integrative Medicine at OHSU
  • Optimization of Multi-Disciplinary Clinics: Models, Business plan, Assessment Tools, Telemedicine – the Future of Multi-D Clinics
  • Reducing Re-Admissions at OHSU
  • Promoting Interdisciplinary Research at OHSU
  • Communication in Action: The Surgical Pause

A Testimonial

Here's what Tim Liem, MD, one of the participants, had to say about the program:

"I just wanted to let you know that I am using some of the important lessons learned in the Paths to Leadership course. As you know, the takeaway message for us (in our project) was that quality is associated with reductions in the day-to-day variability in patient care. That has been the core goal for my efforts to improve quality in the Department of Surgery.  We recently created a department intranet website as one of the tools whose aim is to:
  • Provide all members of the Department of Surgery with easy access to best practices to reduce complications such as surgical site infections, UTIs, VTE, Clostridium Difficile infections, etc.
  • Disseminate our Departmental and Divisional plans for quality and performance improvement.
  • Eventually, replace the older paper-based M and M case report forms with an on-line database that would require one-time data entry only.
  • Ease intern and resident orientation to each clinical service. Interns and residents rotate every 4-6 weeks, and they have to get used to the practice patterns of that service. However, it is rare for residents to get a formal orientation. As you can imagine, when writing physician orders, these residents have little to guide them.

I just wanted to thank you for your guidance thus far."

Cost

There is no dollar cost to participants or participants' departments for this program for the cohort beginning in January 2012. 

Schedule and Time Commitment

The 2012 program is tentatively scheduled to run from Tuesday, January 10, to Tuesday, June 12, on consecutive Tuesdays from 4:30-6:00 PM in 2201 Mackenzie Hall. Typically, participants will spend up to 4 hours per week in pre- and post-session reading and project work.

Further Information and to apply

Contact or 503-346-0365

Application form