Cheryl Martin (Host): Crouse Health is committed to providing resources and opportunities for educational and career advancement for its 3,500 employees. And here to tell us about Crouse's strategic focus on workforce development and recruiting and retaining top talent in Central New York are Kathleen Miller-Murphy, Director of Workforce Development, Women's Health Integration, and Community Engagement, and Jeremy Freund, the Leadership and Professional Development Coordinator at Crouse Health.

 This is the Crouse Healthcast, the podcast from Crouse Health. I'm Cheryl Martin. So Kathleen, let me begin with you. Why is workforce development such a strategic focus for Crouse?

Kathleen Miller-Murphy, RN, BSN, CCE: We have some really great staff at Crouse Health and one of our big investments is in our own staff and our goal is really to create opportunities for our staff to grow with us, to come there, and enter a job and change their course of action if they wish to, to advance their own careers. And as a member of the community with the healthcare workforce shortage, we experienced that as well and we're really looking to invite people into the Crouse family and have them stay with us and spend their career with us.

Host: So, what type of programs and opportunities has Crouse created for union and non-union staff?

Kathleen Miller-Murphy, RN, BSN, CCE: This has been a collaborative effort across the whole organization around building partnerships and utilizing and optimizing our relationship with our 1199 union, and training fund. We have opened our training center, so we have an on site training center in partnership with SEIU 1199 that we opened where staff can have access to computers.

 We do career shadowing and job fairs that are internal for staff really to let them know about what the opportunities are. Sometimes you don't always see what's beyond your own position. There are other jobs within the organization that exist. But really, giving staff opportunity to shadow other jobs, other departments, and provide opportunities where we can support them in this journey, wherever they're starting.

Host: Kathleen, you mentioned a partnership with 1199 SEIU. Can you go a little bit deeper and talk about this partnership and just explain what it is?

Kathleen Miller-Murphy, RN, BSN, CCE: So we have a really model partnership between our union, SEIU 1199 and Crouse Health. We really sit at the table with their leadership and our team here to identify needs for our staff and how collaboratively we can support them and what that looks like. So we have regular meetings where we look at what kind of opportunities the union has for our staff and how we can get that message out to them to support them to utilize these services.

 And it's everything from English As a Second Language, to getting a GED, to financial support, career support. We do financial wellness programs, really anything that will help our staff succeed.

Host: Now, I understand that Crouse has a future leaders program. Jeremy, tell us about that.

Jeremy Freund, MSN, RN, CCRN: The Future Leaders Program was something that was created to give an opportunity for staff in our institution that are not currently in leadership positions, but maybe are aspiring to be in a leadership position or would like to have a little more awareness of what that would look like. So it's an eight month program that you have to apply to be part of.

There's a whole application process to get into the program. And then once you're in the program, we really walk through the building blocks of leadership development, right? Those fundamental things that will provide you with more information on leadership development, but also in just professional development as well, right?

So all of the concepts and the trainings that we do will be beneficial, even if you're not in a specific leadership position. But it does provide those resources that if you would like to go in the future, into a leadership position, you have a good foundation when you get there.

Host: How are candidates selected?

Jeremy Freund, MSN, RN, CCRN: So, as I mentioned, it's an application process. Once a year, we put the applications out. Those that are interested, fill out that application. And really what that application asks is really why do they want to be part of the program. We want people that are motivated, people that are curious.

 After we receive all those applications, we do involve the manager of that applicant to determine, is this someone that would be a good fit for the program? Most of the time, that's just to determine that someone's not on a discipline path, or those kind of things.

And then we sit down as a group, and there's several leaders here at Crouse that will sit down and will determine, how many people we can fit in the program. This year, we had so many applicants that we actually had to run two programs, because we couldn't fit it into one. But the application process is so nice because it really shows us who truly wants to be there. And when we start training, we get a lot more participation because of that.

Host: Does this help a person if they have completed this program? Is that impressive on their resume? Does it really help them move up within the Crouse system?

Jeremy Freund, MSN, RN, CCRN: Absolutely. I mean, anytime that you can see on a resume that someone is putting effort effort for professional development; that really looks good on a resume. We do add the caveat at the beginning that completing this program does not mean you are getting a leadership position. However, when you can demonstrate that you've been diligent to put time and effort to grow yourself, to learn skills that will be beneficial, that always looks good on a resume.

Host: And you mentioned it's an eight month commitment. So, in addition to them having a full time job, how many more hours a week or month would this involve?

Jeremy Freund, MSN, RN, CCRN: Each class is about four hours once a month. So right at the beginning, we inform them of what the hours are, the dates. They work with their leader to ensure that they have that time off. But it is a commitment and I think that adds some value to it as well that these individuals are really taking time out of their very busy schedules.

The organization is allowing these individuals to take time out of their very busy schedules to come add value back to themselves and to grow and to develop. So it is a time commitment, but feedback we've got is they've all found it very beneficial.

Host: Now, you also have a Leadership Institute program at Crouse. What's offered through that program?

Jeremy Freund, MSN, RN, CCRN: The Leadership Institute offers a variety of things and it's continuing to grow. We're in our first year, so we're continuing to grow. Future leaders is part of that. So that was developed specifically for those in the institution that would like to be leaders, but are not yet. We also launched this year, the supervisory leadership series. That was offered for current leaders at Crouse.

Doesn't matter what position you actually have supervisor, director, chief, whatever it is. And that walks through some of those basic fundamental skills that leaders are required to have. Communication, team building, motivating, delegating, goal setting, those kind of things. We are working on for 2025, launching a Crouse Growth Series, which will be available to all employees.

And those will be trainings on different types of professional development skills, whether that be communication, prioritization, things like that. But providing opportunities not just for leaders or not just for people that want to be in a leadership position, but really for anyone in the institution that wants to spend some time in professional development.

Host: Kathleen, anything you want to add about how these programs just add value? And I'm also wondering if it actually makes employees more committed to a career at Crouse Health?

Kathleen Miller-Murphy, RN, BSN, CCE: Absolutely. And, the leadership series has been so well received. As Jeremy said, he had to add an extra series, but, ultimately our goal through workforce development is to create these supports like the Leadership Institute, which is unique to Crouse and be able to support them to thrive.

We want them to thrive personally and professionally, and we want to give them the optimal growth opportunities for all our employees for success. So, that Leadership Institute has been a big part of our workforce development, but we're really starting our workforce development in first grade, believe it or not.

We have a program where we have students in first grade. It's a free field trip called Visit to Hospital Land, and we have integrated all the jobs and duties and different things that we offer at the hospital into that program so that kids are learning early that it's not just doctors and nurses, which people traditionally think of when they come to a hospital, but, you know, we have HVAC, we have IT, we have finance, we have respiratory therapists and physical therapists and pharmacists, and there's so many jobs that make the hospital run, that are so important and critical to what we do. So, we're really looking to create that engagement for all our employees to be successful.

Host: Any other examples that you want to share of career pathways or options for Crouse employees?

Kathleen Miller-Murphy, RN, BSN, CCE: Sure. So a few things that we're doing is, we have been putting together career pathways internally, so that staff that are interested can reach out to our HR team and shadow, but they will also have information to be able to see, based on, where they are education wise, what classes or certifications or training they may need if they wanted to move into another position.

So we're trying to make it as user-friendly as possible for staff to be able to have that forward movement. Diversity is also a big piece of our workforce development. We want our staff to look like the patients that we serve. So we're trying to create that diverse, well, we have created that diverse and inclusive work environment, but we're looking to do that at all levels of the organization. And the community partnerships that we have within the community are also very critical to our workforce development initiatives. And we have partnerships with over a hundred colleges, high schools, and we run programs, whether it's a health career exploration program for high school students so that they can learn about what opportunities are available.

 As I said to the first graders starting out to learning about what kind of jobs and visit to hospital land on their field trips. So we really have, we run the gamut of ages when looking at our workforce development. We also partner with the union on the charge nurse bootcamps. There's a lot of opportunities where we do classes collaboratively, based on the needs of the staff. So, it takes the entire organization and we have been able to put some great programs in place. As far as the career pathways, someone could come in and we just changed this.

Someone could come in, without their high school diploma, say, into an entry level environmental services position and we would help them get their GED. We would help them with the studying, maybe they need a little extra help in math, or writing, and that is all available to them. So, they could conceivably come in and say, you know what, I think I'd like to go and be a perioperative aide now in the OR.

And from there, maybe they're interested in taking the training to be a surgical tech. So, whether it's a nurse coming in that wants to get a nurse practitioner degree, it's even a doctor who maybe wants to get an MBA. You can come into this organization at any level and grow with us.

So that's very exciting and that's a big part of our strategic focus for our current staff and then for anybody who joins us.

Host: That is exciting. So, Jeremy and Kathleen, anything else you'd like to share about workforce development at Crouse that we haven't covered?

Jeremy Freund, MSN, RN, CCRN: In regards to the leadership, and just to mention, you know I mentioned the large programs that we have. We're doing a lot of professional development as well. We are involved in all of the nursing academies to talk about those things that previously were not trained on. Talking about generations in the workplace, talking about different personalities, talking about communication.

So it's been amazing to add in that professional development piece as well, to give this staff here additional resources that they previously would not have gotten. So we don't want to neglect those classes as well. They kind of are a little smaller than the large series that we run, but we've seen some huge benefits from them.

Host: Thank you. Kathleen?

Kathleen Miller-Murphy, RN, BSN, CCE: I think that's a great point that Jeremy made because we do have a very diverse, workforce, so we have all the generations, right, in the organization working side by side and, I think we've done a great job of really looking at what the needs are and then creating, courses because we have the expertise, we have the experience, in creating opportunities around that.

 I will say, we piloted a program for nurse aides, and that's going well and that'll be pushed out within the organization. So, we're really under Dr. Kronenberg's leadership, it's been very easy to be able to identify a need and then fill it. And I think Jeremy, a lot of the classes that professional education, professional development hold are based on that.

We'll identify something that's a need or even a suggestion from staff because those are our best suggestions are the suggestions we get from our staff on what they need. And then we in turn will develop a program to meet those needs. So, I think it's very unique. I think, we have put together some very innovative career advancement opportunities, for all our staff to help create those long term career growth opportunities. And we're very excited and we're very proud of that.

Host: Kathleen Miller-Murphy and Jeremy Freund, thanks for enlightening us on the programs and initiatives available for all employees at Crouse Health. Great information. Thank you both.

Kathleen Miller-Murphy, RN, BSN, CCE: Thank you, Cheryl.

Jeremy Freund, MSN, RN, CCRN: Thank you.

Host: To learn more, visit crouse.org/workforcedevelopment. Now if you found this podcast helpful, please share it on your social channels and check out the entire podcast library for other topics of interest to you. This is Crouse HealthCast, a podcast from Crouse Health. Thanks for listening.