Paper Title (Arial 20 Bold)
Dr. Kathy Cowan Sahadath, Case Consulting and Lorie Shekter-Wolfson, George Brown College,
ACMP Global Conference, April 2012, Las Vegas, Nevada. Page | 1
The Waterfront Campus Project at George Brown
College: Positioning for the Future
y
Dr. Kathy Cowan Sahadath, Case Consulting
Lorie Shekter-Wolfson, George Brown College
Dr. Kathy Cowan Sahadath, Case Consulting and Lorie Shekter-Wolfson, George Brown College,
ACMP Global Conference, April 2012, Las Vegas, Nevada. Page | 2
Executive overview
In the summer of 2012, George Brown College
(GBC) will be relocating approximately 230
full-time faculty and staff, 3500 full time
students representing four schools within the
Centre for Health Sciences (School of Dental
Health, School of Health and Wellness, School
of Heath Services Management, and School of
Nursing), to the George Brown College
Waterfront Health Sciences Campus. As the
largest College Centre for Health Sciences
program in the Province of Ontario, Canada,
its move from two significant sites across
Toronto to a purpose-built facility in the East
Bayfront area is in itself a large undertaking.
In parallel, the school is embarking on a
multi-year initiative to incorporate Inter-
professional Education (IPE) into their Health
Sciences programs. Inter-professional
Education involves learning about, from and
with other disciplines while learning in areas
of common interest in the practice of Health
Care. GBC is enabling graduates to be
successful collaborators in Health Care
practice with the ultimate goal of improving
patient outcomes. This cultural change toward
interdisciplinary learning and teaching is a
eflection of the demand in the Health
Sciences professions for a more collaborative
approach to the delivery of Health Care. This
vision is best expressed by the college:
To create a single site Centre for
Health Sciences building that
em
aces an inter-professional
learning education framework with
an emphasis on health & wellness
To create an environment that is
vital and innovative for future
generations of students
The move to the Waterfront Campus will be a
key enabler for IPE at George Brown College.
The new campus will
ing together corporate
and academic departments with both cu
ent
and new staff who have previously not worked
in the same location before. It will
ing
together four schools consisting of the School
of Dental Health, School of Health and
Wellness, School of Heath Services
Management, and School of Nursing to be at
the forefront of future Health Care. And it will
also create an open work environment that
will encourage many of the faculty and staff
out of their private offices and into a large
collaborative and inter-disciplinary
workspace. The change is significant and
ground
eaking.
Background: The George Brown
College Health Sciences Vision
Health Care has experienced many changes
over the last few decades, including advances
in technology, diagnostic procedures, surgical
methodologies and shorter hospital stays.
Some of the changes have been very positive,
while others would argue that the system has
not gone far enough. At GBC, the vision
formulated in 2003 identified the need for a
more inter-professional education model to
support an improved collaborative approach to
Health Care delivery.
Many of the concerns expressed by both
Health Care providers and patients have been
the lack of a comprehensive system that
addresses Health Care from an integrated
perspective. That is, a system that does not
work in silos but one that can deliver a
seamless a
ay of services from prevention
and promotion to primary care to hospital, to
community, and to home. There has been a
failure to meet the huge demand for home
care services which has left the system further
stressed; families feeling over-burdened and a
lack of qualified Health Care practitioners to
provide these services.
In his report Building on Values: The Future
of Health Care in Canada (2002), Roy
Romanow refe
ed to the need for investing in
more and differently-trained Health Care
providers. The report goes on to say that there
is a “crisis” in the Health Care workforce as
numbers are decreasing while the demand is
increasing. In addition, the report talks about
the need to review how Health Care providers
are trained and suggests moving from
traditional profession-focused education to a
more “patient-centred” approach. This
approach places an emphasis on team-based
learning and understanding of the importance
Dr. Kathy Cowan Sahadath, Case Consulting and Lorie Shekter-Wolfson, George Brown College,
ACMP Global Conference, April 2012, Las Vegas, Nevada. Page | 3
of “multidisciplinary teams and networks of
providers working together to address
patients’ health needs” (Romanow, XXXXXXXXXXIn
esponse to these new challenges and this
sense of urgency in the Health Care system,
George Brown College has become a leader in
driving this change.
“ In view of changing trends,
co
esponding changes must be
made in the way Health Care
providers are educated and trained.
If Health Care providers are
expected to work together and
share expertise in a team
environment, it makes sense that
their education and training should
prepare them for this type of
working a
angement. ”
(Romanow, 2002)
Project Overview and First Steps
This case study identifies three distinct
phases to this major change initiative and
highlights the change management activities
that are supporting two key areas – the
increase in student enrollment through
development of a variety of post
diploma/degree courses and pathways, as well
as enhanced cu
iculum that emphasizes
team-based and system-wide care.
GBC’s continued advancement presents both
challenges and opportunities. To meet the
growing need and demand for the Centre for
Health Sciences, the College has undertaken
the creation of a 320,000 square foot campus
housing the Centre for Health Sciences
located within the East Bayfront area of the
City of Toronto. Cu
ently, GBC’s Centre for
Health Sciences is one of the largest programs
in the community college system within the
Province of Ontario in terms of student
enrolment. It is estimated that the new
campus will service approximately 3500 full-
time students, with approximately 230 full-
time academic faculty and staff, with an
additional 50 corporate staff.
This campus will be based on an inter-
professional and integrated model of student
learning and a new collaborative way of
working together. Students will learn from
qualified faculty in an exceptional inter-
professional learning environment that meets
the sector’s highest standards including the
external professional associations that
accredit the educational programs.
The campus will
ing together corporate and
academic departments, with both cu
ent and
new staff, who have previously not worked in
the same location, and will create an open
work environment. This will be a new
experience for faculty and staff, half of whom
are cu
ently housed in private offices and the
majority of whom are housed with or near
staff from their own programs.
The Project and Leadership
Governance
The three phases to this project included
advancing the vision through a lengthy
process of developing, shaping and
implementing the IPE cu
iculum and
involving staff collaborating in new ways;
secondly, the planning and design process
addressing funding and approvals for a new
campus to accomplish the vision; and finally
focusing on the people readiness and move
equirements associated with transitioning to
this new campus and the new culture.
While implementing this significant
transformation, and given the complexity of
the Waterfront Campus initiative, the
leadership team recognized the need for a
proven, mature project management
methodology, effective communications and
change management plans as well as
employee engagement and clear management
accountabilities. This integrated approach to
change involved the alignment of relevant
combinations of people, processes, policies,
practices, strategies and systems at GBC.
One of the leading contributors to project
success was strong, visible sponsorship and
leadership. In the early stages of the project,
there was an opportunity to build a
Dr. Kathy Cowan Sahadath, Case Consulting and Lorie Shekter-Wolfson, George Brown College,
ACMP Global Conference, April 2012, Las Vegas, Nevada. Page | 4
foundation for managing the change that
would help mitigate the impact of the changes
on both the staff and the organization. Two co-
project sponsors, the Vice-President of
Corporate Services, and the Assistant Vice-
President, Waterfront Development and Dean,
Community Services and Health Sciences
eported to the President of George Brown
College and provided this critical sponsorship
and leadership, articulating and
communicating the vision throughout all
phases of the project.
The leaders’ roles were well articulated from
the start. The Assistant Vice-President
Waterfront Development took on the primary
ole of
inging both the corporate divisions
including, Information Technology, Facilities,
Student Affairs, and Business Services
together with the Academic leaders to create
and design the new campus. In addition, the
same players continued to collaborate and in
turn prepared their staff for the new space,
further ensuring their commitment. These
leaders all benefited from the process, and the
change management principles helped guide
their meetings, conversations and
communication strategies.
The key change management challenge was to
keep the leadership team involved, aligned
and communicating about the project, and
ensure that they were prepared to deal with
concerns across the college.
Two separate but connecting teams, the
Construction and Design/Structural Advisory
Team created in Phase 2 and the Operational
Readiness Chairs Committee created in Phase
3 and their governance structures, both
eporting to the Waterfront Steering
Committee and chaired by the President,
provided oversight and governance to ensure
alignment and inclusiveness of all groups,
academic and non-academic.
The Chairs of the Operational Readiness
Committees ensured that key issues raised by
the respective committees were addressed and
that there was continuity across committees.
The Waterfront Campus Governance
Structure was a unique approach to ensure
school interests and program success were
met.
Operational Readiness Governance included:
Change Management Advisory
Physical Move
Professional Development and
Training
Integrated Student Services
Internal Communication
External Communications/Marketing
Safety and Security
Business Services
In addition to the attention to operational
eadiness, the Construction and
Design/Structural teams were also supported
y a number of teams created to ensure
success of the overall GBC Waterfront
Campus Project. The committees collectively
worked to establish linkages between
functional departments (academic and
corporate) and other project committees
including the Construction Advisory Team,
Relocation Consultants, and various internal
GBC departments.
Expected challenges
The project teams anticipated a number of
potential issues that were to be addressed in
the change management strategy, including:
Potential negative impact to the
personal lives of faculty and staff
esulting from new commuting patterns,
outes, and modes or lack thereof.
Concerns from some faculty and staff
about changes to daily work routines
and relocation from an office to an open
space workspace environment.
Managing the integration of corporate
and academic functions and work
environments.
Managing the integration of Health
Sciences programs delivery.
Dr. Kathy Cowan Sahadath, Case Consulting and Lorie Shekter-Wolfson, George Brown College,
ACMP Global Conference, April 2012, Las Vegas, Nevada. Page | 5
Establishing business process changes
and ensuring adoption of new policies
and procedures.
Managing cultural changes that will
arise from the amalgamation of smaller,
more intimate programs located at
different sites into a larger more
integrated Centre working side by side
in the same space.
Managing work dynamics as individuals’
spheres of influences, privileges,
working relationships, and neighborly
interactions are unsettled and then
edefined.
Change management was recognized by the
sponsors in the early stages of the project and
addressed in many ways. Developing an early
communication strategy, working closely with
academic staff in addressing the needed
changes and incorporating them in the initial
project design were the first steps to foster
support for the vision and expected changes.
Phase 1 set the foundation for a number of
innovative opportunities and interventions to
uild the case for change. Examples included
enovating space for pilot collaboration and
interactive use of learning technologies,
creating newly integrated cu
iculum with
faculty members from across departments and
organizational governance changes to a single
director for the Centre for Health Sciences.
By the time the funding was needed for Phase
2, the case for change was