Program Promotes Diversity in Health Care Management
The first class of GNYHA's Health Care Leadership Institute graduated on June 18, 2007, at a ceremony hosted by GNYHA. The Institute, an executive development program designed to promote racial and ethnic diversity in health care leadership, was jointly sponsored by GNYHA and the City of New York's Baruch College School of Public Affairs. Sixty-two middle managers from diverse racial and ethnic backgrounds, who were selected to participate in the program by their CEOs, participated. Graduates received certificates of completion endorsed jointly by Baruch College and GNYHA.
Goals and Curriculum: The Institute was conceived by GNYHA's Advisory Task Force on Diversity in Health Care

Participants in GNYHA's Health Care Leadership Institute

Beth Abraham Center for Nursing and Rehabilitation Beth Abraham Health Services Beth Israel Medical Center Brooklyn Hospital Center Cabrini Medical Center Casa Promesa Residential Health Care Facility Coler Goldwater Specialty Hospital and Nursing Facility Coney Island Hospital Continuum Health Partners-Corporate Flushing Hospital Medical Center Gouverneur Nursing Facility Harlem Hospital Center Kings County Hospital Center Kingsbrook Jewish Medical Center Lenox Hill Hospital Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center Mount Sinai Hospital New York Downtown Hospital NYU Medical Center NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital North Bronx Health Network North General Hospital Northern Westchester Hospital Our Lady of Mercy Medical Center St. Barnabas Hospital St. John's Riverside Hospital St. Luke's-Roosevelt Hospital Center St. Mary's Hospital for Children St. Mary's Center, Inc. Schnurmacher Nursing Home Silvercrest Center for Nursing & Rehabilitation SUNY Downstate Medical Center Village Care of New York Visiting Nurse Service of New York Visiting Nurse Regional Health Care System Wyckoff Heights Medical Center

Leadership, which comprised civic and business leaders from diverse communities as well as hospital and continuing care CEOs, and was established to advise GNYHA's Board of Governors on ways to increase the racial and ethnic diversity in the leadership of GNYHA's member institutions. The creation of the Institute was one of the primary recommendations of the Task Force, which the Board accepted in 2005. The Institute was designed to support the creation of a pipeline and network of talented professionals of diverse backgrounds who will be available to help lead health care institutions in New York. It is expected that, with the successful completion of the program, participants should be ready to assume new levels of responsibility within the health care field, whether in their own institutions or in others. CEOs were asked to assist their selected candidates to assume these new levels of responsibility.

The Institute's course of study provided an overview of the best practices in health care management, including strategic planning, financial analysis, communication, and dealing effectively with cultural diversity. Classes were held once or twice a month in the evening on the Baruch campus in Manhattan. Participants worked in clusters, researched a current issue in health care, and presented the findings of their research to the class and to Baruch faculty and members of GNYHA's executive staff during the final week of class. 

Reflecting Diverse Communities: With communities becoming increasingly diverse across the country, it has become critically important for all health care institutions to undertake efforts to create workforce and leadership teams that reflect the communities they serve and that can help to attract patients. The GNYHA/Baruch College Health Care Leadership Institute is designed to assist GNYHA members in meeting this challenge.  GNYHA appreciates the efforts of the 36 member institutions who participated in this pilot class of the Institute (see box). This effort will  be evaluated as a way to inform the structure of future classes.

Other Diversity Initiatives: In 2005, GNYHA launched the Center for Trustee Initiatives and Recruitment to help GNYHA members recruit highly qualified, talented, and skilled candidates from diverse racial and ethnic backgrounds and connect them with available appointments on health care boards of trustees at GNYHA member hospitals and continuing care facilities. The Center's efforts have been fruitful thus far, with 15 trustees placed at four hospitals, three health systems and two continuing care facilities. The Center's efforts are an ongoing service available to GNYHA members. Members may contact Mary Medina at GNYHA to avail themselves of the Center's services. 

In addition, since 1994, GNYHA has sponsored the Summer Enrichment Program (SEP), which provides undergraduate and graduate students in health care management with summer internships in GNYHA member institutions (see Skyline News, June 11, 2007). The program's goal is to expose the students to the real world of work in health care management, to expand their networks for possible employment upon graduation, and to encourage them to seek employment in New York. The 2007 SEP internship is currently under way. Two of the graduates of the Health Care Leadership Institute are former SEP students.

 

                       

Seated, l. to r.: Natashia Elie, Institute graduate and Summer Enrichment Program alumni, Gouverneur Healthcare Services; Trevor Abrahams, Institute graduate, Our Lady of Mercy Medical Center; Roseles Delgado, Institute graduate and Summer Enrichment Program alumni, Our Lady of Mercy Medical Center; Elsa Rios, Faculty, Baruch School of Public Affairs; Manuel Delgado, Institute graduate, Kingsbrook Jewish Medical Center. Standing (background), l. to r.: Earnest Liggens, Institute graduate, Kingsbrook Jewish Hospital Center; Cherry Ann Jock, Institute graduate, North General Hospital; Amy Kaufman, Director, Project Development, GNYHA; Lloyd Bishop, Vice President of Government Affairs and Community Health Initiatives, GNYHA.

Foreground, left to right: Lynette Alvarado, Institute graduate, St. Barnabas Hospital; Sandy Freeland, Institute graduate, Village Care of New York; Xiomara Lantigua, Institute graduate, St. Mary's Center, Inc.; Michelle Oxley, Institute graduate, Beth Abraham Center for Nursing and Rehabilitation; Patricia E. Wilson, R.N., Institute graduate, Visiting Nurse Service of New York. Background, left to right: Aliyah Ansari, Institute graduate and graduation ceremony speaker, Memorial Hospital for Cancer and Allied Diseases; Edison Bond, Jr., Institute graduate, SUNY Downstate Medical Center.

Clockwise from foreground: Arthur Brown (back to camera), Chief and Medical Director, Employee Health Services; Victor Ribaudo, Associate Hospital Administrator; and Aliyah Ansari, Institute graduate and graduation ceremony speaker, Memorial Hospital for Cancer and Allied Diseases; Manuel Delgado, Institute graduate and graduation ceremony speaker, Kingsbrook Jewish Medical Center; and Denise Patrick, faculty, Baruch College.

Left to right: Amy Kaufman, Director, Project Development, GNYHA; Sarah Saxeed, faculty, Baruch College; Ada Villatoro, Institute graduate, Coney Island Hospital; Elsa Rios, faculty, Baruch College; Stuart Altman, faculty, Baruch College.

Tanya Straker (left) and Marian Scott, Institute graduates, Continuum Health Partners	Priya Gosain (left) and Roger Franco, Institute graduates, Lenox Hill Hospital
Left to right: Lloyd F. Torres, Institute graduate, Silvercrest Center for Nursing and Rehabilitation; Andrea Campbell, Institute graduate, St. John's Riverside Hospital; Jacqueline Herrera, Institute graduate, Cabrini Medical Center; Natasha Eli, Institute graduate and Summer Enrichment Program alumnus, Gouverneur Healthcare Services; Hector Maldonado, Institute graduate, Mt. Sinai Hospital