The agency will develop the Office of Workforce Development to increase recruitment, training, and retention of a diverse public health workforce therefore strengthening systems and policies to assist in maintaining our core infrastructure. Collaborating with internal and external partners will effectively provide opportunities to address health disparities and advance health equities. The Office will address agency needs identified improving all aspects of statewide public health. In recent years, lack of investments in predominantly rural communities comprised of populations with economic and social challenges, medically underserved, and disproportionately affected by COVID-19 along with other public health problems has become apparent. ¿Fundamental to workforce development is identifying gaps in knowledge, skills, and abilities through assessments of organizational and individual needs, and addressing those gaps through targeted training, and professional development opportunities.¿The agency will monitor and redefine its professional development strategies from informal, just-in-time training primarily focused on work processes, to a more systematic and structured culture of learning. We will encourage quality and performance improvement, promote greater accountability and transparency, enhance relationships within¿communities, and increase cooperation and collaboration with other agencies and organizations. Specific tracks of work will provide a new strategic map prioritizing our focus for the next five¿years to strengthen workforce capacity. ¿The agencies’ workforce development plan supports activities coordinated by a¿strategic planning committee and includes additional complimentary activities identified through assessments, related to health disparities, enhancing health equity and quality improvement. To effectively meet critical public health needs and protect and serve our citizens, we rely on several cross-cutting skills and capacit
ies that support basic public health protections, programs, and activities vital to the agency’s ability to meet community health needs and achieve equitable health outcomes. Ensuring the agency’s ability to meet these foundational capabilities requires strengthening the agency’s ability to meet or exceed national standards aligned with the identified capabilities including assessment and surveillance, policy development and support, communications, community partnership development, organizational competencies, performance management, accountability, and equity. Improvements in systems, processes, and policies ensuring a strong core infrastructure is crucial to empowering the agency’s continuing efforts to strengthen and support advancement in the delivery of essential services. The agency continues to demonstrate improved policies, systems, and processes to meet the needs of our communities. Addressing foundational capabilities associated with public health, specifically accountability and performance management, the agency participated in the PHAB accreditation process and received an accredited status and currently in the process of pursuing reaccreditation. We have made improvements in branding, tribal relations, and other areas identified in the original accreditation process, but continual improvement is necessary to effectively perform critical health services. The agency will make several organizational changes to strengthen the public health work force and recruitment efforts, improve processes and policies, and address lack of infrastructure. As the lead agency providing core public health functions and essential services, we have identified a lack of resources and capacity to make the critical infrastructure improvements needed to strengthen our data environments, improve agency processes, policies, systems, and increase our interoperability. The goal is to invest in modernizing our public health systems and develop new core competencies and capabilities
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