These days, leadership means dealing with volatility, uncertainty, complexity and ambiguity—also known as VUCA.

Extraordinary leadership is the key to building high-quality health care and medical schools. However, when it comes to developing a medical career, acquiring the skills of leadership is traditionally not valued as highly as the technical and academic competencies. At NOSM, we are focusing on helping our learners, faculty and staff to become great leaders.

Organizations are demanding that physicians have a higher capability for leadership in order to face the challenges of modern health care. A report by the Institute of Medicine recommends that academic health centres “develop leaders at all levels who can manage the organizational and system changes necessary to improve health through innovation in health professions education, patient care, and research.” The report points out that these leaders must help “define the future, align people with a vision, and remove obstacles to allow people to see this vision.”

Going above and beyond
Here at NOSM, we are fortunate to have brilliant people who not only carry their roles, but also take on the mantle of leadership for our school at external bodies and in high positions to serve society. Hundreds of our learners, faculty, staff, and administrators take on these additional and honourable positions. Here are some:

Dr. Catherine Cervin will be appointed as the new President of the College of Family Physicians of Canada, official as of this Friday, November 6, 2020. As President, Dr. Cervin will be the foremost voice for academic family medicine across the country. She also sits on the board of Health Sciences North (HSN) on behalf of NOSM. I cannot express how proud we are of her accomplishments.

In December, Dr. Roy Kirkpatrick will assume the role of NOSM’s appointee to the Council of the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Ontario (CPSO). I want to thank his predecessor Dr. Robert Smith, for his contributions on our behalf. Dr. Tara Baldisera is the School’s representative on the Medical Council of Canada; Dr. Joseph LeBlanc serves on the Board of Directors of Maple Leaf Centre for Action on Food Security; Mr. Ray Hunt is on the Board of St. Joseph’s Health Center in Sudbury and the Ministry of Health Expert Panel on Ontario Health Teams; and, Dr. David Marsh serves on the Steering Committee of the Institute for Clinical Evaluative Sciences ICES-North, the Thunder Bay Regional Health Research Institute, and represents NOSM internationally at the Towards Unity for Health Consortium.

For my part, I am on the Boards of Thunder Bay Regional Health Sciences Centre, Health Sciences North Research Institute, ICES and Health Services Organization (formerly Accreditation Canada).

There are the numerous and critical positions that our clinicians dedicate to hospitals and clinics as Chiefs of Staff, Medical Officers, board members, and others. Dr. Sarah Newbery is not only our Assistant Dean, Physician Workforce Strategy, she’s also co-chair of the Board of Northern Ontario Academic Medicine Association (NOAMA), she served a recent sixteen-year role as Chief of Staff at North of Superior Health Care Group in Marathon, chair of the Northern physician resources advisory council, and a member of the provincial primary care COVID-19 advisory table, to name only a few. Dr. Stephen Cooper is NOSM’s Medical Director of Continuing Medical Education (CME), Chief of Staff at Manitoulin Health Centre, as well as chair of District 9 of the Ontario Medical Association.

These examples are only the tip of the iceberg. I speak on behalf of the entire NOSM community when I say we are sincerely proud and humbled by the dedication of our faculty, learners and staff who are such inspirational leaders. Representation at provincial and national organization tables, especially during a pandemic, takes time and energy on top of your day jobs. Your dedication is highly valued at NOSM. We thank you.

Accreditation visit update

Speaking of dedication, I must acknowledge the work of our Accreditation team. The full MD program CACMS accreditation visit just happened. Ours was Canada’s first ever virtual visit and I have to say, it went well.

Thank you to the leadership in UME and the accreditation core team, all of you, the theme co-chairs, the SLCs, the clerkship leads, section chairs, division heads, the NOSM executive group, our hospital and university partners, PEC members, faculty, staff and all of our students. A special thank you to the IT support that made the whole week go well.

Thanks also to the CACMS team who met with us over three days on WebEx:

• Field Secretary, Dr. Susan Andrew, PhD, Department of Medical Genetics, (University of Alberta);
• Chair, Dr. Dominique Dorion, MD, MSc, FRCSC, FACS (Sherbrooke University);
• Secretary, Dr. Taryn Hearn, MD (Memorial University);
• Members, Dr. Darrell White, MD, FRCPC (Dalhousie University) and Dr. Barbara Barzansky, PhD, LCME Co-Secretary, American Medical Association;
• student, Julien Lépine (University of Montreal);
• faculty fellow, Dr. Ewan Affleck, MD (CACMS); and,
• faculty fellow, Dr. Annabelle Cumyn, MD, C.M., MHPE (Sherbrooke University).

And, it is not over yet! There will be at least one more full-day virtual visit on December 4, 2020. We will receive our final status later next year, so stay tuned for a full update.

Overall, I am optimistic. Although accreditation is not like a light switch that you simply turn ‘on and off,’ it is an ongoing Continuous Quality Improvement (CQI).  While we still have an incredible amount of work to do—more than I thought—the good news is that when we receive the report to the Dean, we will know exactly where to focus our efforts. Although the work ahead is challenging, I am committed to ensuring we have the best team working, in the best interest of NOSM, as our highest significance. Accreditation is our collective first priority.

And, accreditation is a marathon, not a sprint. Although success in marathons is an individual effort, success in accreditation is more a relay race that depends on team effort. So, stay tuned. I will let you know how things progress.

Leadership Matters
It’s important to remember that individual clinicians and medical schools only have limited control over the fate of their patients and institutions. Any organization that provides health care or teaches health education knows that it takes superior coordination, information sharing, and teamwork across the disciplines to improve values and outcomes.

Traditional leadership styles are often resistant to change, fending off innovation and easily overwhelmed by the need for CQI. This style of leader views innovation as “added workload,” rather than new approaches, which should be integrated into their day job. I want to prepare NOSM’s leaders for the future, as they will be asked to focus on outcomes and use performance measurement as a motivating tool to organize their colleagues and drive improvements. Please recognize, you will be involved and rewarded for your innovation.

When we review the areas of non-compliance revealed by our MD accreditation and when leading conversations about modernizing our School, it is critical that we use our transformative skills required within our strategic plan. The challenges are similar whether we, as leaders, are working in a large integrated delivery system, a hospital, a large multispecialty physician group, or in a medical school. Although our tactics will vary from one setting to the next, the broad roles we assume as leaders will not.

Leadership means sharing and encouraging others to advance their unique talents in their individual roles. I see those qualities in so many of you as learners, faculty and staff. I value and appreciate everyone’s contribution to the School. To this end, we are supporting many of our staff, faculty and students in leadership opportunities. An example of this is the RAFT, a new program in which 15 NOSM emerging leaders are being sponsored. Created by Dr. Mamta Gautam (PEAK MD, aka “the Doctor’s doctor”), the RAFT is a learning and support network for women in medicine.

Another amazing initiative is the NOSM’s recent addition to the Mayor’s Task Team in Sudbury. Dr. David Marsh and Dr. Mike Franklyn have agreed to represent NOSM in this essential role to approach very difficult issues like housing, homelessness, systemic racism, the opioid crisis, as well as mental health and addictions in the city. This is NOSM in action in health-care advocacy to influence the determinants of health, and is just the beginning. Are you on a board, committee, or have a leadership role for NOSM or outside your work? Please share with me what you are doing. All your contributions have a positive impact on our society. I would like to know more about what individuals of the NOSM community are doing to improve our world.

Thank you, miigwetch, merci to all.

Please continue to follow my journey on Twitter @ddsv3 using #WhereisDrVerma.

I welcome input on this blog and other issues you want to bring to my attention by email to dean@nosm.ca.

Best Ever Whole School Check-up! 

Our web-based, whole school check-up on October 30 was a really heart-warming hour. About 180 participants joined me as we shared ideas on coping with the pandemic (in all forms including exercise, walking with dogs, and a few games featured prominently). It was great to ‘see’ everyone and reconnect. Join us on December 15 at 8 a.m. (WebEx link will be announced) for the ‘Ugly Holiday Season Sweater Contest’ and other updates. NOSM is a wonderful place to work and learn; the people are magnificent.

Successful LEG Leads Meeting

Our LEG leads and administrators meeting was a great success. More than 70 participants took part in wonderful workshop led by Drs. James Goertzen, Sarah Newbery, Cathy Cervin, and Sarah McIsaac. This couldn’t have happened without the leadership of Dr. Ed Hirvi, President of the Physician Clinical Teachers Association and Co-Chair of the NOAMA Board, who chaired the event. Thanks to Sarah Bazinet and Joey McColeman for their support. The presentations from Sudbury Emergency, South Temiskaming and the Huntsville LEGs were really amazing.

Thank you to the PGME team for organizing a great retreat and sessions with Dr. Theresa Chan on the future of medical education and data analytics, a panel discussion on Equity and Diversity in PGME Curricula, and a talk by award-winning author of From the Ashes, Jesse Thistle. We heard compelling personal reflections from frontline faculty and a NOSM student leader on specific actions we can all take to challenge racism and adopt actionable anti-racism, diversity strategies in residency education. A key takeaway was that actions speak louder than words and the challenge is to do more than listen, we must also encourage and invite people to act.