I’m headed off to visit my family and will be away from work for a little while. Hope everyone has a safe and happy Fourth of July. When I get back, I’ll be transitioning into a new role at UTMB, in the business development and marketing area. I’ll be building up and further developing utmbhealthcare.org, our UTMB patient portal. I’m looking forward to refocusing on web work, and promise to share more about it in the coming weeks and months.
A few people asked my why the flags were at half staff earlier this week (they’re back up now). Guesses ran the gamut, from comedian George Carlin to local legend Ruth Kempner. The flags at a state institution can only go down by order of the Texas governor. In this case, they were down for the passing of Rep. G. E. “Buddy” West, a politician from west Texas. Details are online….
I heard today in a meeting that a section of the famous “White Hallway” (connecting the Towers to John Sealy Annex) is closing for updates and renovations starting July 7. The first part to close is the south section; that phase will last 3-4 weeks, to be followed by the second phase at the north end of the corridor. The work will address a number of necessary issues, and equally important, improve the look and feel of one of our most heavily traveled areas. We have some visuals from FOAM and will work to get those online to iUTMB and the construction site. Best bet will be to avoid the area, using the cafeteria and hallway by Patient Services as alternate routes, or jumping up to the second floor. Those who were around for the renovations to the Main Street corridor or John Sealy Hospital entrance know that by comparison, this will be cake. Eventually, the new areas of Children’s Hospital, the garden, and Main Street wil all tie together with a complementary look and feel.
A few months ago news circulated about a significant contribution supporting the work of the Osher Lifelong Learning Institute at UTMB, a community outreach effort led by Dr. Michelle Siepina offering those over age 55 an opportunity to grow intellectually and socially, and have a good time doing it. I was glad to hear it; I’ve followed OLLI’s good work several years, and have always been impressed by what they do and by what their senior students have to say about them. Registration’s open now for the summer sessions. I’m not 55 yet (getting closer every day), but if you are or know someone who’s got a little time and curiosity, it’s definitely worth taking a look…
Recognize the tall guy in the UTMB baseball cap? He may look like the newest trainee in Facilities and Operations Management, but it’s actually UTMB’s president, Dr. David Callender, who spent a few hours last week making the rounds behind the scenes in Rebecca Sealy Hospital. His trainer and escort for the afternoon was Joe Allen, of FOAM’s east campus service team. Dr. Callender has been making it a priority to get out and get in touch with UTMB employees. He’s been hosting “On your Mind” sessions—small informal meetings with groups of about a dozen employees (there’s talk of doing the next one at 2 am to give night shift staff a chance to talk with him). The afternoon he spent in Rebecca Sealy with Mr. Allen is part of an effort to spend time “In your Shoes.” For his next outing, he may be coming to an OSA desk near you…
I’m still struggling to come to grips with the idea of a world without Roger Stone. Roger was a friend and a colleague. I met him early in my career at UTMB, and our paths kept crossing professionally and socially. He was always calm, always positive, always smiling. I never heard him say anything bad about anyone, and whenever there was work to be done, he was always the first to step forward. I never heard “that’s not my job” from him—even when we knew something wasn’t. One of those unofficial jobs was serving as our campus vanpool and commuter transportation guy. The van he drove was famously popular, usually with a months-long waiting list for an open spot. He made 30 minutes on I-45 fun, like he made life fun.
I ran across an email from him today, a message so fresh and relevant I wanted to reply, until the reality and finality of this weekend’s accident slapped me with the cold and harsh truth. Our most recent project together started just a couple of weeks ago; we were working to develop and share additional commuting options and information for UTMB employees. It was a big project, and not something that would benefit him personally. He was at the table with us late that afternoon because he knew $4-a-gallon gas was hurting employees, and he could help. That’s the kind of guy he was, always thinking of others first. That’s what he did late one dark, stormy, terrible night in the Gulf of Mexico. His brave and selfless act bought two young men a future. But it cost him his life.
Roger died a hero. It’s not the first time he’s earned that title. He died doing one of the things he loved. He leaves a huge, painful, sad void for all of us who knew him, and especially for his family. All I can do is honor his memory, and it seems so horribly, utterly inadequate.
The memorial service for Roger is this Thursday, June 12, at 5 p.m. at Clear Lake United Methodist Church (16335 El Camino Real, near Bay Area Blvd in Clear Lake). Rather than flowers, an education fund for his two kids is being established at the Bank of America in Clear Lake. I heard there may be a second memorial service of some sort on campus, later.
If you’re calling a UTMB colleague this week and get put on hold, you’ll hear something new mixed in with the classical music that normally fills your ears. We’ve reintroduced a “voice on hold” program, where recorded messages about UTMB and its programs are mixed in with music. We originally piloted this in 2006; we recorded the first messages on my laptop with a $30 microphone and my mumbly voice. Those first messages didn’t sound so hot, but gave us enough information and experience to come back with a good plan and process. We pitched a proposal to leadership, and through a collaboration with Information Services, Marketing and our public affairs area, launched it this week. You can read more about the system (and hear the first messages) here.
I’d like to thank Erin Swearingen for taking on the management of the system, Jim McCurdy and Candy Galan for lending us their voice talents, and David Svegliato, Connie Lausen, Barry Rexford and Ivan Howard for their technical support. Take a listen and send us your ideas.
The annual emergency preparedness meeting for all UTMB staff was hosted yesterday to a packed audience in the Levin Hall Dining Room. Dr. Joan Richardson and Mike Megna, our campus preparedness officers, set the stage for two hours of information from city, county and university representatives. Materials from the meeting have now been posted online, courtesy of Mike Megna and campus business continuity guru, Gayle Cantrell.
One of the toughest things I’ve done was travel around campus in the past year and listen to a common refrain: folks said they didn’t get enough of the good news about UTMB; that we were never in the media; that they never read/saw anything but bad stories. I had the benefit of seeing daily media clips in our office, so I knew there was lots of good news. There was a disconnect, however, and an important question: how best to widely share the good news and media highlights?
For several years we’ve been offering a subscription-based service. About 1200 people had signed up to get the daily UTMB news clips electronically, sent to them via mail. That was working OK, for the few people who knew about it. We knew we had to do something else with a broader reach. We started talking about a weekly summary, and ended up with what you saw yesterday and today: UTMB in the News, delivered daily via email.
I went into this with mixed feelings, concerned about burdening people with yet another daily email. I joked with my colleagues about their “spam.” But one of the newest members of the Public Affairs team, Mike Cooper, came up with a great, low impact design (and he’s also working hard on our new web home pages). The media relations folks keep plugging away, pitching great stories and people. A process was worked out. Information Services provided their usual great support, and the message was born. Feedback has been overwhelmingly positive, and I think I learned something: people want to feel good about where they work, what they do, why we matter. So, at the end of the day, the option of being “plugged in” to good UTMB news is worth the few extra keystrokes it takes to delete a message.
If you have a question or comment about UTMB in the News, please send it to public.affairs@utmb.edu.
OK, so the meeting’s not just about hurricanes, it’s about emergency preparedness in all its shapes and forms. But come June 1, my thoughts turn to the tropics, and this annual meeting we host at UTMB is like the Memorial Day weekend: a sign that summer is here. I love the summer: it means vacations, swimming, being barefoot at the beach, blue crabs and BBQ, ripe watermelon, spending time with my kids. But as with all things, with summer’s good comes some bad: heat, humidity, high cooling costs, bugs, crowds—and the “H” word.
After a lifetime spent at risk from hurricanes, I’m starting to learn that worry doesn’t do much good. Preparation and planning, on the other hand, are golden. With this in mind, join our institutional preparedness officers Dr. Joan Richardson and Mike Megna in the Levin Hall Dining Room next Monday, June 9 from 1 pm until about 3 pm to hear from all the areas at UTMB that can help you start planning and getting ready.