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Photography by Reed Hutchinson
UCLA Photographic Services
Ready to assist the lost and confused at the medical center
are hospital ambassadors Barbara Rosenstein (left) and Trudy
McCully. Their volunteer roles were created by a PDP staff
team.
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Professional Development Program
Staff teams find solutions for campus
BY Wendy Soderburg
UCLA Today StafF
Navigating the maze-like hallways of the UCLA Medical Center is
now easier for the public, thanks to Ambassador Services volunteers
who escort them to their destinations. They’ll even help them
find their cars in the parking structure.
“Our patients are so very thankful that someone is there to
help them,” said Kathy Sipes, director of volunteer services
for UCLA Healthcare.
Ambassador Services is the result of some targeted problem-solving
by participants in Campus Human Resources’ Professional Development
Program (PDP), a one-year leadership and career-enhancement opportunity
for full-time employees in the Professional and Support Staff classifications.
Each year, PDP members work on special projects across campus, gaining
new skills and broader perspectives on UCLA operations.
In the case of Ambassador Services, a PDP team considered ways to
help the public navigate the medical center better. They made recommendations
on the type of volunteers, uniforms and signage that was needed.
They even developed a training program and designed a logo.
“We made a lot of suggestions, most having to do with signage,”
said Regina Lark, assistant director of the Center for the Study
of Women and a team member. “Most people don’t walk
into a hospital willy-nilly; they’re going with some sense
of purpose. It’s getting them to their destination that’s
important.”
On another project, Joseph Chiu, systems administrator for the Department
of Psychology, said his PDP team was charged with helping Communications
Technology Services (CTS) streamline its operations so that a typical
phone-service order could be completed within a few days rather
than weeks. They called their method of analysis “brown-paper
process mapping,” a lengthy procedure that involved interviewing
40-45 CTS employees and mapping each employee’s role in a
task on brown paper that was taped to the walls of rooms and hallways.
“What was interesting was finding that not everyone understood
their role in the same way, even if they were doing the same thing,”
Chiu said. “We were able to identify some inefficiencies.
Our goal was to simplify the process and recommend, whenever possible,
how to combine steps.”
CTS director Mike Schilling praised the PDP team for being “totally
committed and focused” and added that the brown paper stayed
up for several weeks until his staff decided on the processes. “We
are now taking all that we learned from the PDP exercise and incorporating
it into the implementation of our new database,” he said.
The skills learned by PDP participants are multifold, said Marsha
Coutin, coordinator of career development services in CHR. Besides
gaining experience in researching and analyzing data, writing, technology
and teamwork, “it’s also a chance for participants to
showcase their talents to someone outside their departments,”
especially to senior administrators, she said.
Assistant Vice Chancellor Lubbe Levin and Robert Gibson, director
of training and development for CHR, guided a third PDP team in
evaluating the new-employee orientation.
“They made a series of very coherent recommendations, including
creating a presence on the Web that’s clearly identifiable
for new employees,” Gibson said. “They wanted us to
schedule a full orientation more frequently, and they wanted it
moved to a central campus location, like the Faculty Center. And
food was a consistent theme,” he added, laughing.
Gibson and his staff are designing the new orientation now and hope
to have it ready for fall. “It was beautiful, I’m telling
you. They should have charged us,” he said. “They were
just a consummate team of professionals.”
PDP is accepting applications until May 20. For details, go to www.chr.ucla.edu
and click “Training and Development.”
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