PRESIDENT’S COLUMN Presidential Term at Midpoint: Some Reflections NCS Leadership By Romergryko Geocadin, MD, FNCS Matt Koenig just reminded me to send in my article for the President’s 2014-2015 Column for Currents. So what do I write now? With a little bit of reflection, I realize that I just passed the midpoint of my term as NCS president. Then I Officers realize there have been a lot of exciting stories to tell. Romergryko Geocadin, MD, president Ed Manno, MD, vice president The start of the term was stressful in many ways. NCS has been very successful since its founding. Michel Torbey, MD, treasurer As I was coming in from the vice president to the president role, I told myself that I did not Gretchen Brophy, PharmD, secretary want to be the first to drop the ball. But as the excitement of the Annual Meeting was kicking in Seattle, I suddenly fell acutely ill and needed to be hospitalized. I missed the last three days of J. Claude Hemphill III, MD, the meeting. There was some doubt about whether I could continue as president. immediate past president This is where the tight bonds and amazing work ethic of the NCS leadership shone the brightest. Since we have solidified the officers as a leadership group, it was not hard for them to continue Board of Directors the key tasks while I was recovering. While I “laid low” for a month, the day-to-day leadership Mary Kay Bader, MSN, CNS was taken over by the vice president and the officer group. Soon after, I personally “regrouped” Neeraj Badjatia, MD and – together with the NCS leadership – focused on the crucial components that continue to Gretchen Brophy, PharmD make the NCS successful. Here are some reflections at the midpoint of this term. Guadalupe Castillo-Abrego, MD Jan Claassen, MD The people: NCS members are used to adversity. NCS members love challenges. NCS members Sherry Chou, MD love to innovate. NCS members are enthusiastic. They live in the ICU where “nothing is simple” and they deal with “life and death” issues all the time. Making an organization successful has Jennifer Frontera, MD to be a cake walk, right? Well, not really… The trick is how to harness all these energies into David Greer, MD effective projects. We needed to have better communication and coordination. Geoffrey Ling, MD, PhD Sarah Livesay DNP, RN One of the first things we did was to organize regular meetings not only with the officers, Board Susanne Muehlschlegel, MD of Directors, and Executive Council but also with all the committee chairs. Once we clarified DaiWai Olson, RN, PhD the strategic plans with each committee leader, our task was to provide them with resources, J. Javier Provencio, MD empower the committee co-chairs, and get out of their way as they completed their tasks. Denise Rhoney, PharmD We now have a monthly conference call and the progress of each committee is shared with all the Fred Rincon, MD committee chairs. In this way, we make everyone aware of what is happening in the society. It is David Seder, MD with joy that I let you know that all the committees are now successfully achieving their targets. Kevin Sheth, MD The committees are the engines of the society. The details of the committee accomplishments are Lori Shutter, MD provided in my monthly updates. Jose Suarez, MD Panayiotis Varelas, MD, PhD Working for the mission: As a young organization, we have to start planning activities that are Paul Vespa, MD financially beneficial to the society. This is the only way we can sustain ourselves and keep the mission going. At the start of this term, we had to make some serious strategic decisions about Wendy Wright, MD which projects to fund, and which projects have to wait or be eliminated. Projects cannot move Susan Yeager, RN, MS on enthusiasm alone; we needed a cogent financial plan for each project. We are planning traditional and not-so-traditional ways to contain our spending and generate funds. Executive Director Many of us extended our volunteerism by donating our services (i.e. honoraria) to the society. JoAnn Taie We have started a membership fund-raising campaign. We are also gearing up to organize a philanthropic arm for the society. We have restructured our fund raising strategy that focused not only on the Annual Meeting but on engaging sponsors in year-round activities. This is starting to Editor-in-Chief, Neurocritical gain support with several large sponsors engaging us in activities that will generate educational Care products such as webinars. Eelco Wijdicks, MD, PhD We have also developed the on-line portal for NCS educational products. But also key is the momentum that ENLS is gaining nationally and internationally. We are in the process of Neurocritical Care Society improving our website and membership directory which will serve as the backbone of the 5841 Cedar Lake Road, Suite 204 e-commerce that will serve as an engine for our future revenues. Minneapolis, MN 55416 Meaningful partnership with our executive staff: As the society grew, we exceeded the previously Phone: (952) 646-2034 defined support structure in our executive office/association management company (AMC). In Fax: (952) 545-6073 an effort to accommodate our rapid growth, we tried a model that provided for hourly rates. Website: www.neurocriticalcare.org With the hourly model, our cost for staff support expanded beyond our yearly projections. Email: info@neurocriticalcare.org Something had to change. We needed to restructure the way we worked with our executive staff and we needed to restructure our association management company (AMC) payment structure. Drastic changes were undertaken at every level and every activity of the NCS. After a careful review and planning with the NCS leadership and key senior members, we successfully renegotiated our rates and restructured our support package with our AMC leadership. Since then, a positive tone in the collaborative work of members and executive staff has been palpable. Now that we are a little past the midpoint of this term (but still with four months to go), momentum has been generated. A lot of great things are still going to happen. Let’s keep up the great work, NCS! 3
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