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Hello ASHHRA Members,

As promised in last month's letter, I wanted to share the goals your ASHHRA Board is working very diligently on for this year. Each of the goals are aligned to our three year strategic plan. I am extremely pleased with the focus and effort to date and I am highly confident we will have a very successful year.

Board members Grace Moffitt, Maureen O'Keeffe, and I are exploring the whole idea of certification for health care human resources professionals. Since our business segment is going to explode with the advance of baby boomers needing health care services, we are exploring the idea of a valued product, an educational component, and a potential partner in this quest. This is very strategic and we are currently in the research phase.

Board members Karmen Reid and Tom McCawley are working on a laundry list of important actions to improve service to the chapters/regions including trying to increase chapter membership, assisting chapters with mentorship programs, and monthly e-mails to chapter leaders. For the regions, goals have been established to include more information on newsletters, regular calls with chapter presidents, and providing at least one advocacy representative at each state conference.

Board member Paul Morlock and President-elect Irma Pye have developed a three tiered approach to establishing an exciting and extremely valuable new program for you. They are currently working on Tier One. We will tell you more about it in the coming months, so stay tuned.

Board members Marit Brock and John Ostrom have defined very specific goals in increasing Non-Hospital membership by three percent, which is 20 additional members for this year. They are planning to reach out to several non-hospital professional groups for partnership opportunities and will develop a Non-Hospital Track of presentations for our annual conference and target market potential attendees. They will also ramp up the ListServ to include all current non-hospital members and propose to update our marketing road show presentation to market the non-hospital segment.

Board members Joe Miccuci and Paul Morlock have engaged the area of technology and have identified and reviewed six areas for potential improvement: optimization of technology, and proposed upgrades including online purchasing, launching e-books, a member spotlight, and establishing blogs, just to mention a few.

Board member Nicole Morin-Scribner and Immediate Past President Jeff Payne have begun work on the issue of wellness and establishing a culture of health in our organizations and providing the tools to our constituency for doing so. This effort will include communicating best practices and presenting findings, but most importantly providing you with the tools you need in your organization.

We have also identified opportunities for our organization to become more proactive in partnering with other Professional Membership Groups (PMG) within the AHA to include leadership in policy and advocacy, education and sponsorships, educational presentations in our field of health care human resources, and collaboration on important and pertinent initiatives in our field. ASHHRA Executive Director Stephanie Drake, CEO Board Member Melissa Kinnaird, and I are working on these initiatives with the entire Board of Directors.

Have a great month and I will continue to provide status on a quarterly basis.  

Robert Walters, SPHR
Corporate Director, HR Operations
Health First, Inc.
3550 North Harbor City Blvd.
Melbourne, FL 32932-0069
(321) 434-1957
bob.walters@health-first.org