The Evaluation Process and Operational Plan of the School of Medicine Strategic Plan will follow the concepts and process outlined in the Strategic Planning Toolkit of the Group on Institutional Planning (GIP) of the Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC) (2023). This process is intended to help define our School of Medicine’s direction, align goals to ensure cohesive progress, identify areas for improvement, enable competitiveness, and cultivate areas of excellence.

The evaluation of the Strategic Plan will be the responsibility of the Strategic Planning Committee (SPC) of the School of Medicine.  The SPC will engage in quality improvement cycles as part of the operational plan.  The evaluation will follow the PDSA Model (derived from Edward

Deming’s PDSA cycle). The process is as follows:

  • PLAN – The Strategic Planning Committee will request an operational plan, from the responsible individuals, for each of the Strategic Plan’s Objectives.
  • DO – The responsible individuals will implement the operational plan for each objective.
  • STUDY – The Strategic Planning Committee will assess compliance with outcome indicators by the delineated timeline and define if the objective was met.
  • ACT – If the objective was partially or not met, the Strategic Planning Committee will decide on new strategies that should result in the objective being met and will re-start the PDSA cycle.

The Strategic Planning Committee will meet regularly to evaluate all ongoing and will complete activities of the strategic plan and their outcomes. The Strategic Planning Committee will modify the strategies suggested to meet the outcome indicators at any time during the 5 years of the strategic plan. If deemed necessary, outcome indicators may also change to be more reliable in demonstrating that the plan’s objectives are being met.  These plans will be put into action and results will be reevaluated.

The SPC will develop an Operational Plan that will delineate specific steps to meet the Strategic Plans’ goals and objectives. The operational plan will include, as a minimum, the following aspects:

  • Budget needed to support the success of the strategic plan.
  • An implementation plan including the responsibilities, timelines, actions, fiscal impacts, and resources to support the strategies.
  • A communication plan that specifies how and when to communicate the progress and to share information with stakeholders and the academic community.
  • The monitoring (PDS cycles) process to continually evaluate the strategic plan to address obstacles, identify opportunities, and adjust where necessary.