Learn more about the OSU Medical Center's Diversity Committee and the focus on creating a diverse team of faculty and staff in this week's video blog.
Hi! As you know one of our Medical Center values is innovation, the ability to think differently about a problem or issue and find a unique and effective way to solving it. Innovation is what medical research is all about - trying to find a better way to help people who are ill.
Innovation is what will differentiate us in the future as we invent new ways to improve health care, especially in the field of personalized health care.
In order to have true innovation and creativity of thought, you have to have people who think differently, people from different backgrounds, a diverse team. That's why diversity and its acceptance are core to our existence here. It is not only the right thing to do, it's also a necessary part of us fulfilling our mission.
I recently ran across an article about Creativity and Leadership. In this research based on interviews with people doing highly creative work in many fields, the investigators learned that innovation is more likely when people of different disciplines, backgrounds, and areas of expertise share their thinking.
So, not only do you need to have a diverse workforce, you need to have diverse teams to get the best results, working in a culture of trust and acceptance where people can share their thinking without fear of ridicule.
Here at the Medical Center, a new Diversity Council, led by Dr. Chip Souba and Pete Geier, is working on creating this culture of inclusion, a culture of trust and acceptance.
The Diversity Committee, a component of the People Plan, has established four work groups with several initiatives aimed at enhancing diversity across the Medical Center. They include: Creating scorecards- to track and analyze progress of diversity programs, Working with executive search firms to ensure diverse candidate pools, Developing information about the diversity council, our initiatives, and progress right on our interal website, OneSource, as well as on our external OSU Medical Center website, Developing diversity training for faculty and staff, Training clinicians on the cultural differences of our patient mix, so that we can enhancing our cultural competency, Finally, increasing enrollment of underrepresented students in our College of Medicine.
One major component of the Council's charge is to oversee coordination of Medical Center diversity efforts with those at the University, and to better promote University diversity programs here at the Medical Center.
Additionally, last week I had the opportunity to address the Medical Center's new Women In Leadership Council, a group of senior women leaders who are meeting to network, learn, and increase collaboration across our organization. We hope that their efforts will result in recruiting, retaining, and promoting more women in leadership positions at the Medical Center.
You know, this time of year might be a great time to learn something more about the diversity of your colleagues' and their holiday celebrations, their family traditions, and their memories related to this special time of year. Who knows, you might adopt one of their ideas, try their food, or their customs as part of your family celebration.
Well, have a great week!