AdventHealth’s chief learning officer is preparing the next generation of healthcare workers

When AdventHealth first reached out to Lamata Mitchell about a chief learning officer (CLO) role, she thought they might’ve gotten the wrong person.

Mitchell holds advanced degrees in English language and literature/letters, and she has dedicated much of her career so far to academia. Most recently, she served as vice provost of academic affairs and student learning at Pima Community College in Arizona.

Even though she didn’t have experience working in healthcare, she soon realized her background could transfer to a learning and development leadership position with AdventHealth, a network of hospitals and care sites across nine states. The healthcare system, which traces its roots to the Seventh-day Adventist Church, has a mission of “extending the healing ministry of Christ.”

“It’s a dream role for someone who lives and breathes learning and loves to talk about learning,” Mitchell, AdventHealth’s chief learning officer since March 2022, told Healthcare Brew.

As AdventHealth’s first-ever CLO, Mitchell focuses on integrating learning opportunities into the day-to-day work of the organization’s employees. She said she hopes to be proactive about anticipating the needs of the healthcare sector so that AdventHealth employees are ready to take on new roles in the future.

Predicting future needs

AdventHealth, which is headquartered in Altamonte Springs, Florida, aims to make the health system a “dynamic learning community” as one goal in its strategic plan—with Mitchell advancing that work.

Before Mitchell joined, the institution offered learning opportunities through a university, leadership institute, and learning network. Since taking on the CLO role, she said she’s focused on ensuring career growth opportunities are available to employees who aren’t yet in leadership roles.

“Those who are not leading a team—what are the learning opportunities that we have available for them to continue growing?” she said.

AdventHealth offers employees tuition reimbursement for 20 healthcare certificates they can earn from its university.

“We try to align those certificates with what the needs are within the company, so that when people have finished the certificates and they’re ready to make that transition into a different role, there is a position available for them to transition into,” Mitchell said.

In 2022, 525 AdventHealth team members earned certifications, according to the network’s ESG consumer report. The company employs nearly 90,000 people, Mitchell added.

Mitchell said her team uses Lightcast, a workforce intelligence technology, to anticipate the healthcare industry’s future workforce needs and respond to those issues. This might mean not only taking into consideration the nursing shortage but also looking into whether AdventHealth will need more surgical techs or medical assistants in the future.

If the health system anticipates dealing with an aging population, “we need to ensure that we have those who are qualified to meet the needs of that particular segment of the community,” Mitchell said.

Integrating learning and work

Prior to the Covid-19 pandemic, many of the learning programs AdventHealth offered were designed to take place in a classroom, according to Mitchell. She’s been thinking about how to reach employees virtually, as well as help integrate learning into their everyday jobs.

Mitchell said she wants learning to occur “in the flow of work,” so that the training’s “not taking people away from the bedside or from the frontlines to sit in the classroom for an hour,” she said.

Mitchell worked with AdventHealth’s diversity, equity, and inclusion team to produce a “microlearning” video, for example, that offers lessons on social determinants of health in just minutes.

At the end of the day, Mitchell said she wants to drive home the message to her workforce that learning is about more than just compliance. She recognizes she won’t realize all her goals in the role overnight, though.

“The challenge for me is wanting to go too quickly because you have to make sure that you bring everyone along,” Mitchell said. “So that means slowing down a little bit, so people understand what the vision is.”