For faculty workshop registration, kindly click here.

Introduction
Traditionally the success in academic medicine was related to scholarship, research, teaching and clinical practice. Nowadays, daunting challenges are crumbling the careers of growing physicians, clouding their visions and reducing their achievements. Hidden opportunities are either missed or inadvertently foreseen by busy clinicians overwhelmed with patients’ care. When faced with organizational challenges faculty members more often than not struggle because of insufficient knowledge in administration and management skills. Even change management and means to address its percussions needs proficiency and skillfulness that most faculty members may not be endowed with. Among other important factors hindering the progress of their careers is cost containment in health care and poor financial projections of their businesses in medicine. What does it take for a faculty member to convert adversities into opportunities and lead a balanced path in his professional and personal career?
In order to succeed in clinical care and the management of a department, division, program or even service, faculty members should be equipped with the right soft and hard skills in leadership and management. Proper identification of the key success factors to their practice in relation to the industry and adequate mapping of their position in relation to the market segments are essential requisites for any strategic growth. As such faculty members need to sharpen their managerial skills, broaden their perception to clinical care through continuous development. 

Mission 
The faculty development mission is to foster career advancement of faculty members in various aspects of leadership, management, teaching, communication, and mentoring. The committee will strive to provide a supportive culture of congruence and innovation at the AUBMC. The committee will commit to enhance and fulfill the faculty individuals’ vision and prospects as well, while maintaining a balance between the personal and professional life of each. The faculty development committee will also maintain and develop the health of its faculty members and ensure that they are self-satisfied because success in their profession is contingent on their well being.

Vision
The faculty Development committee sees the faculty at the AUBMC leading the way not only in teaching, research and patient care but in the management of all business aspects of medicine. Through proper channeling of faculty individuals’ core competencies and all divisions and departments capabilities, that the well being of patients and the community as a whole will be exalted in the AUBMC.

Goals and Objectives
The FDC is designed to support all its faculty members in the development of their business skills in medicine and to help them fulfill their personal goals and prospects. These improvements will be channeled to the development of their career in medicine, providing a benchmark in the region for leadership and management.
The support to the faculty members will focus on several aspects in their career such as the development of their professional practice, improving their leadership and management skills, promoting their communication and negotiation skills, balancing their personal and professional life, and improving their working environment.
The FDC will assist in the following areas:

• Rounding up the professional performance of faculty members by instituting leadership skills
• Growing the faculty member’s administrative and managerial skills
• Helping faculty members in acquiring and holding offices and administrative positions
• Assist faculty members in converting simple motivation into intrigued volition
• Sharpen their intuitive business mind and strategic thinking
• Enhance faculty members’ professional visibility
• Promote their Teaching capacities and skills
• Improve their communication skills, E-mailing
• Help them manage all kinds of conflicts including conflicts of Interest
• Stimulate Intra-departmental and cross-departmental collaboration
• Guide faculty members to meet the mission and vision of their corresponding departments
• Assist in the development of an organizational culture based on transparency, high ethics and team spirit
• Establish a comfortable, enduring and beneficial working environment
• Helping faculty members fulfill their personal goals and objectives
• Assist faculty members in balancing their personal and professional lives

Challenges to the Faculty Development Committee

• Identification of areas of Interest
• Conforming the areas of interest into the right mold per division and department
  1- Individual Development Plan IDP
  2- Division or Department Development DDP
• Introduction of new concepts such as economics in medicine, financial management and others
• Bridging the gap between medicine and Business
• Logistic issues related to Programs and Workshops such as Time Table
• Processes of enrollment
• Resistance to Change in the Implementation and cultural issues

Strategy for Implementation

• Identification of Areas of Interest
  Develop a survey to screen the individual needs, strengths, weaknesses and interests of all faculty members (see appendix A). The information will help in addressing both the individual interests and what is needed for the division or department
• Individual Development Plan for Each Faculty Member
  This can be achieved by compiling information retrieved from the survey designed for identification of areas of interest
• Examination of the Five-Year Development Plan of the Corresponding Department and Communicating It with All the Faculty Members
  Each faculty member will review the five year development plan of his or her corresponding department and will project his or her opinion on the various aspects of the plan
• Congruence Between Personal Faculty Interests and Department’s Mission
  Congruence between personal prospects, individual successes and achievements with departments’ missions will be ensured through bridging the gap between personal vision and interest and the corresponding department or division vision and mission, and by capitalizing on individual assets pertaining soft and hard managerial skills to the benefit of the medical center
• Conforming the Areas of Interest into the Right Mold per Division and Department
  This will start by obtaining the Individual Development Plans for each faculty member using the above mentioned survey information, namely pertaining to the strengths, weaknesses, and areas of interest. This will be followed by sharing and communicating to the faculty members the corresponding department plan and Vision. Common ground where individual interest conforming with the department vision and mission will be drawn. For instance a faculty member knowledgeable in negotiation skills or who has a financial background will be encouraged to further develop those skills and later be solicited to assume a position in the department that can be of mutual interest
• Start the Process of Faculty Development by an Orientation Session as an Introduction
  1- Mission and vision of the Faculty Development Committee
  2- What is our agenda?
  3- How can we help?
• Implementation of New Concepts
  The faculty development committee will help faculty members navigate through the environment of clinical practice and academic affairs with a bird’s eye view of the global aspects of medicine. By implementing new concepts faculty members will be able to seize, analyze and indulge into opportunities not only confined to clinical medicine but also to the non-clinical aspects such as negotiation, leadership, management, marketing in medicine and others. They will be able to tap into hidden opportunities, between various disciplines and industries. Faculty members will also be able to diligently address matters related to the administrative and financial aspects of their divisions and departments. They will be able to read and analyze balance sheets, revenues and cash flow statements, and take sound financial decisions related to the purchase of a medical equipment or the development of a new service will be readily available. The faculty development committee will also help faculty members in matters related to the management of conflicts pertaining to changes in policies and processes within the institution as a whole or within a division or service. Because we live in a dynamic world where external and internal challenges grow perpetually rendering a static position rather defenseless with limited ability to grow, faculty members need to be pro-active, and to conform to changes in our environment.
• Design activities to meet the individual needs of the faculty members and those of the corresponding department.
• Workshops
  1- Personal consults
  2- Build channels with financial institutions designed to the needs of the faculty members: 
      * Cushion line 
      * Credit cards 
      * Shareholders in multi-clinic services 
      * Personal loans
  3- Build channels with insurance companies to get the best premiums.
  4- Get best memberships in SPA and gyms.
• Resistance to Change
  In order for innovation to happen and to engage faculty members in development through their attendance to workshops and activities, we as faculty development committee need to stimulate the sense of need. We need to highlight the missed opportunities in their environment, the hidden weaknesses and problems before becoming full blown threats. Examples would be the suboptimal usage of budgets, the negative balances in a financial statement, the flaws in a business plan or poor financial ratios. We have to train faculty members to become idea scouts and mindful for all the opportunities around them. We have to remind them that the mindless habitual behavior is the enemy of innovation and that in order to be leaders and not laggards, they need to have a kaleidoscopic view of the new horizons in medicine and health care system in general. We also need to nourish their own dreams and make their inspiration grow within the realm and vision of their corresponding department or division. In a nutshell, we need to increase their awareness regarding the importance of developing their managerial and leadership skills in their practice in order not to miss advantageous prospects for the faculty of medicine while preserving their own personal visions, ambitions and growth. Providing a culture of sharing, friendship and fostering collegiality and streamless flow of ideas, projects and information among the various medical disciplines.

Future Activities Of The Faculty Development Committee 

• Workshops
  Growing the faculty member individual administrative and managerial skills through the attendance of multiple workshops in various fields such as but not limited to: 
  1- Leadership
  2- Management
  3- Change management
  4- Communication skills
  5- Marketing
  6- Negotiation skills
  7- Operation management
  8- Process re-engineering
  9- Accounting
  10- Finance
  11- How to develop a business plan
• Enhancing and Improving the Environment in Which Faculty Members Practice and Operate Through:
  1- The Initiation of multidisciplinary workshops among various medical disciplines with the following:
      * Share the five-year plan in different departments
      * Enhance flow of ideas and information among various disciplines
      * Help identify missed opportunities
      * Optimizing usage of resources by merging constraints
  2- Creating teams to address emergent issues of prime importance and urgent nature, similar to the concept of “Just in time”. This team will attenuate any growing conflict either in the horizontal plane or vertically along the chain of administration.
• Developing a Network Among Faculty Members of the Same Department or Division in an Attempt to Bridge the Gap Between All Faculty Members. This Can be Achieved Through:
  1- Organizing activities that gather common interests and hobbies among faculty members
  2- Nurturing the team spirit and the culture of joint cultivation
• Providing Individual Consultations for Personal Plans and Projects
  1- College funds
  2- Retirement funds 
  3- Personal short term and long term investments
• Provide workshops for health development