Update on VP&S Strategic Planning

Dear Colleagues,

Over the last weeks, I have been visiting with VP&S departments and institutes to share some of the priorities from the Dean’s office and hear from faculty about what is on their minds. Spring is always a time of renewal and it has been encouraging to learn of new ideas and opportunities in these meetings—driven, at least in part, by a desire to cultivate the excitement and meaning we derive from our work in this post-pandemic time.

As I have shared previously, one key part of our focus on renewal is the strategic planning effort that has been launched over the last several months. The first phase, occurring now, is dedicated to collecting information from the broad VP&S community and identifying major areas of opportunity for advancing our mission and positioning you to flourish in your careers. I am delighted that many of you have been supporting this initiative by participating in interviews, joining in small group discussions, and taking the recent survey. The emerging themes from this phase echo many of the discussions I’ve had with you over the last months. The second phase will involve creating working groups to develop strategies to address the themes and priorities that have been identified. We are on track to be sharing more information about those themes and priorities in early May and launching working groups later that month. Your engagement in this effort is critical for its success and I welcome your thoughts and suggestions at any point during the process.

Even as this effort is continuing, we are focusing on how we will translate the plan into action moving forward. A pitfall of strategic planning can be the creation of grand plans with uncertain connection to the organization and its day-to-day operations. To ensure the strategic plan drives the decision-making of departmental chairs, directors, and VP&S administrative leadership moving forward, we will tie the plan to a shared definition of success in each of our missions with corresponding metrics that measure our progress. We will also integrate the plan into our process of regular planning and evaluation for our departments and other entities, including setting annual school and departmental goals and periodic engagement of external advisors. We have initiated this approach with a process for establishing research priorities in the basic science departments and will be working with the clinical chairs to restart the clinical department planning and review process. Many departments have been doing this already and it is clear how helpful these internal and external discussions can be for ensuring that all parts of the organization are aligned in supporting departmental goals and resource needs. This conversation will continue over the next months and be shared with the VP&S community.

It is very important, in discussing these plans, that we not lose sight of the fundamental reason we are engaged in this work. The overarching purpose of strategic planning and complementary initiatives such as our well-being work led by Lou Baptista and the anti-racism initiative dedicated to inclusion and diversity is to support you, the people who make VP&S what it is, and to ensure that you are able to live your best professional lives at the medical school. The emerging picture of VP&S described by the results of our well-being and strategic planning surveys is in some ways very clear. The vast majority of you are inspired by the excellence of your colleagues and the high purpose of your work, and you also say that you share the values of this institution where you have chosen to make your careers. These are precious assets we possess.

There is also, however, a broadly felt desire to ameliorate the daily nuisances—no less dispiriting because they are often trivial and bureaucratic—that can interfere with both job performance and satisfaction. Some of these have deep historical roots; some, the consequence of our complex institutional structure. Seizing the opportunity to improve our operations and your daily work experience—positioning each of you to maximize your contributions to advancing our mission—is my highest priority and one we work on daily. I will be writing to you in the next few weeks about a series of dedicated initiatives, some new and others familiar to you, meant to work in concert with the strategic planning initiative and bring us closer to this goal as quickly as possible.

The conversations I have had with you about taking practical steps toward building VP&S’s future have been energizing and I look forward to continuing this discussion. The residual impact of the pandemic combined with more recent challenges facing health care providers are still being felt in our community. In this moment, it is more important than ever to refocus on the extraordinary value of the work we do to our patients, our community, and society as a whole. Aligning our goals and the strategies for achieving them will be critical for our success. I’m deeply appreciative of your partnership in this endeavor.

All my best,

Katrina Armstrong, MD
Dean of the Vagelos College of Physicians and Surgeons
Executive Vice President for Health and Biomedical Sciences, Columbia University