Make sure to understand the “ask” from your division, department, or company.
Before confirming you are willing to take on this role, get a clear vision of what you are being asked to accomplish. There are so many opportunities to improve the DEI landscape. Therefore, knowing what you are specifically being asked to do will be critical to your success.
Are you being asked to work on diversity?
Does your institution want you to focus on and improve the recruitment and retention of trainees, physicians, or staff underrepresented in medicine? If so, you will need to have access to all the prior work and statistics. Capture the landscape before your interventions (% underrepresented in medicine [URiM] trainees, % URiM faculty at each level, % of URiM trainees retained as faculty, % of URiM faculty being promoted each year, etc.) This will allow you to determine the outcomes of your proposed improvements or programs.
Is your employer focused on equity?
Are you being asked to think about ways to operationalize improved patient health equity, or are you being asked to build equitable opportunities/programs for career advancement for URiMs at your institution? For either equity issue, you first need to understand the scope of the problem to ask for the necessary resources for a potential solution. Discuss timeline expectations, as equity work is a marathon and may take years to move the needle on any particular issue. This timeline is also critical for your employer to be aware of and support, as unrealistic timelines and expectations will also set you up for failure.
Or, are you being asked to concentrate on inclusion?
Does your institution need an assessment of how inclusive the climate is for trainees, staff, or physicians? Does this assessment align with your division or department’s impression, and how do you plan to work toward potential solutions for improvement?
Although diversity, equity, and inclusion are interconnected entities, they all have distinct objectives and solutions. It is essential to understand your vision and your employer’s vision for this role. If they are not aligned, having early and in-depth conversations about aligning your visions will set you on a path to success in your early career.
Know your why or more importantly, your who?
Early career physicians who are considering taking on DEI work do so for a reason. Being passionate about this type of work is usually born from a personal experience or your deep-rooted values. For us, experiencing and witnessing health disparities for our family members and people who look like us are what initially fueled our passion for this work. Additional experiences with trainees and patients keep us invigorated to continue highlighting the importance of DEI and encourage others to be passionate about DEI’s huge value added. As DEI work can come with challenges, remembering and re-centering on why you are passionate about this work or who you are engaging in this work for can keep you going.
There are several aspects to consider before taking on a DEI role, but overall, the work is rewarding and can be a great addition to the building blocks of your early career. In the short term, you build a DEI community network of peers, mentors, colleagues, and friends beyond your immediate institution and specialty. You also can demonstrate your leadership skills and potential early on in your career. In the long-term, engaging in these types of roles helps build a climate and culture that is conducive to enacting change for our patients and communities, including advancing healthcare equity and working toward recruitment, retention, and expansion efforts for our trainees and faculty. Overall, we think this type of work in your early career can be an integral part of your personal and professional development, while also having an impact that ripples beyond the walls of the endoscopy suite.
Dr. Fritz is an assistant professor of medicine in the division of gastroenterology at Washington University School of Medicine, St. Louis. Dr. Rodriguez is a gastroenterologist with Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston. Neither Dr. Rodriguez nor Dr. Fritz disclosed no conflicts of interest.
