President’s Blog: Time to map our future

By Rik Ganderton
President & CEO

We’ve come a long way since we introduced and implemented our Plan-On-A-Page.

In the almost three years that we have been working from this strategic plan our world has changed. Changes in health care have included the tightening of available funds, largely thanks to the great recession of 2008-09, and other changes including in how we are governed, which come into effect in 2011. (Read my future blogs on topics such as the Excellent Care For All Act -- and more.)

The new strategic planning process was launched by the Board of Directors in late April. Vice-President of Quality Improvement and Transformation Michele Jordan is leading the process and working with a Strategic Planning Operations Committee and a Strategic Planning Steering Committee, which is chaired by new Board chair Jay Kaufman. The new planning process is our opportunity to renew our focus.

A strategic plan spells out where an organization wants to go, how it’s going to get there and helps us decide how and where to allocate resources. It’s a way of mapping our future. Rouge Valley has started the process of developing a new strategic plan to guide us during the next three years.

Essentially, this plan will be our corporate document that will help us skate to where the puck is going to be, rather than where it is now. Ultimately the hospital Board of Directors will approve and refine our draft of the new plan-on-a-page by January 2011.

But your input is needed to truly get this plan rolling. We don’t simply want to push this information request out, we want you to be part of this important process and to help shape the future directions of your hospital. The core information we gather for input to the process must come from you — our staff, physicians and volunteers. You know what has been working and what has not been working for our patients. Your views are vital.

So for starters, please visit our brief online public survey. (Staff, physicians and volunteers have already completed a survey.) Please click on this survey link before the end of the day on Tuesday, July 13, 2010.

We are also seeking the views of our key health system partners (e.g. other hospitals, CCAC, family physicians, long-term care homes), our Community Advisory Group, community agencies/groups, and political leaders. We are doing this through surveys, face-to-face meetings, focus groups, our electronic newsletter and publicly via social media such as blogs.

This fall, after we have analyzed all of the information and feedback collected, we will bring concepts and drafts to all staff, physicians and volunteers through our many internal forums: Town Hall; Leadership Forum; the Medical Advisory Committee; the Medical Staff Society, our two strategic planning committees and other groups.

Surveyors from Accreditation Canada last year found that we had an extraordinary number of internal and external people knowledgeable about our Strategic Plan On-A-Page. And we want even more of you in the know and actively participating this time please. For a refresher, here’s a link to our current plan as posted on our hospital’s public website.

- Rik