Response

Building trust, strengthening community, and communicating value.

Building trust requires transparency, communication, and responsiveness. This requires direct-line interactions to understand the needs of members in a variety of practice environments to best serve the membership’s needs. Communicating with chapters prior to impactful decisions whenever possible to gauge priorities, needs, and foresee potential problems is essential. A membership that feels heard, trusts and sees value in its organization, and freely shares that truth with others is an effective vehicle to retain and recruit.

Strengthening community requires connection. EPs face a variety of challenges that require real-time answers. Increasing the accessibility of College expertise and the ease with which members with similar interests and needs can connect with each other builds value and community. Facilitating follow-up to these connections at in-person meetings further develops community. When ACEP is the go-to for speedy answers to tough problems, whether learning from others who have already been through similar situations or solving problems together, we build strength, efficiency, and purpose and demonstrate unique and indispensable value. We are stronger together – with our wealth of diverse opinions and experiences – working effectively toward common goals, benefitting from lessons learned, and recognizing the excellent work being done in all corners of the profession.

Communicating requires the right channels. ACEP needs to clearly communicate its values and value to members. Personally, I’m grateful to find a service or product that improves my quality of life in a manner consistent with my values, while providing value proportional to the investment. Great gains have been achieved by our leadership, members, and staff that are not always known to general and potential membership, in part because our inboxes and notification queues are already overflowing. For EPs to determine for themselves if ACEP’s values are consistent with their own and if ACEP provides value commensurate with the investment, the relevant information must be provided via channels that are already part of their routine or easily become part of their routine. Clarity of our organizational values so that they are easily identified and used as a consistent lens through which to view organizational decisions is of utmost importance. In-person connection, such as between colleagues working side-by-side in the ED, at the state level in leadership and advocacy, and professional community building at all levels may be key to communicating a richer dimension of value.

Bing S. Pao, MD, FACEP

(California)