A healthcare facility is only as good as its staff, and a new employee needs a thorough and thoughtful orientation in order to function effectively, both in the job and as part of the workplace culture. To help new staff hit the ground running, the Labor Management Project (LMP) has developed a New Employee Orientation program that covers essentials like effective communication, customer service, problem solving and managing conflict. Twelve labor and management staff from Interfaith Medical Center (IMC) recently completed a three-day train-the-trainer program on how to teach the program. Some trainees also observed as LMP facilitators Maria Charles and Samantha Morales trained 15 new hires. “Our facility really needed this program. When new employees begin working at IMC, they tend to forget how to treat our patients. We want them to feel like a part of the Interfaith family,” says Sheila Arthur-Smith, a patient care technician in the IMC accounts department.

Although some of the participants admitted to feeling nervous about training their colleagues, they received a lot of hands-on experience. They participated in a variety of interactive activities, including role-playing speaking in front of their colleagues. “I am looking forward to using these new skills to train my peers,” says IMC Senior Clinical Instructor Natalie Williams. “I think our new employees will definitely benefit from this training.”

Janel Gunn, a newly hired RN, says learning about the DiSC Behavior Assessment tool was her favorite part of the training. Through this assessment tool, the participants learned about four behavior types that show up in the workplace and how to interact with their coworkers based on their individual work styles. “I had a lot of ‘aha’ moments during this training,” says Gunn.

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