Annual EMSC Grantee Meeting

Joint Session with State Partnership Grant

Managers and Family Representatives Advisory Committees:

How to Develop and Utilize the Best Team for EMSC Initiatives

June 20 – 22, 2006

JANE BALL: We’re going to do this a little bit differently than a lot of the other sessions because we wanted to make sure that we stay true to the objectives of our session, which are -- okay? And so we’re going to have state two strategies for recruiting key partners for your advisory committee, describe five components of an effective committee leader, and describe three ways to effectively use advisory committee members to achieve your grant objectives. And each one of our speakers is going to speak to each one of these objectives in turn, so we’re going to just keep them all here at the table, and then we’ll be answering questions at the end.

I just want to do a brief overview, the characteristics of some of your advisory committee members -- the people you bring to the table -- that’s so important to get a wide variety of characteristics. A lot of them are decision makers and leaders. They have the ability to influence other people. Some of them, because they’re new, will need some education, and they need to be persuaded or motivated to actually do some of the work that you need them to do. Some of them are free thinkers. And this is especially valuable because you need the creative ideas to help you develop strategies that are going to help you and your program be successful. But universally, they’re busy people, so you’ve got to find ways to work with them very effectively. And I think a lot of them are going to members of state organizations, which means they’ve got the ear of a lot of other health professionals that they can help educate and motivate to assist you in your efforts.

Okay. One of the things that we know is each of you have different ways that your advisory committees are formulated. Some of you actually have a committee that’s established. There’s legal authority for that committee. It identifies some formal responsibilities in that case. Sometimes, you’ve got formal appointment to that group. Maybe it’s a governor’s advisory committee, and the governor actually selects who your participants are. Sometimes, it’s a subcommittee of another formal entity within your state government, like a subcommittee of your EMS board. And then, sometimes, you’re just going to be starting from ground zero, and you’re just bringing together people who are interested and forming a whole new committee.

Important thing to think about is what is the role these advisory committee members are going to have? Are they going to be passive? Are they just going to be listening to updates? Are they going to be hearing reports? That’s probably not going to be real interesting to these really busy professionals, so you want them to have an active role. You want them to participate in an analysis of your system. You want to identify the priorities that they may become engaged in, or that you need for system change, serve on project task forces. And you want them to inform and educate other state decision makers so that you are able to move forward.

So as you come together with your committee, you need to develop a vision and a strategy for how this group is going to work together. So, help create a mission statement or a vision statement so that everybody has an understanding about why they’re at the table. You may want to conduct a strategic planning session to engage them, so that they all know what the priorities are and are invested in helping you achieve those priorities. You may want to brainstorm to identify achievable change. And they want to have ownership. You need them to have ownership on the direction that you’re actually taking with your group.

So, we want you to empower action. We want to be developing teams or task forces so that you can address the issues. We need you to identify and secure resources so these people can be effective. Maybe it’s other volunteers. Maybe it’s some financial resources. Maybe there are other resources out there that you can think of. Think about strategies to overcome barriers. Every one of you has barriers in your state with regard to these performance measures. Think about what they are. These people may help you overcome those barriers. And keep the communication flowing. If they don’t keep having information coming to them, you really are not going to be able to accomplish a whole lot. And let the stakeholders know that they are key players in educating their constituents, their patients, their professional colleagues, as well as the decision makers in the state. What we have today, I have three EMSC managers who are here, who are going to share experiences that they’ve had in working with their advisory committee. And I have Melia Jenkins from Florida; I have Rhonda Philippi from Tennessee, and Scott Hogan from Washington State. And I believe, Melia, you get to start.