There are days — too many days — when we all come to work and have to bite our tongues or roll our eyes or slam our door in frustration when something happens that just MAKES US WANT TO EXPLODE.
Maybe it’s that co-worker who calls out “sick” for the 10th time this month, and every one of those days just happens to include a warm, sunny afternoon (and miraculously, she’s always better by the next morning). Maybe it’s that educational partner who refuses to answer email after email, forcing timelines to shift into summer, then fall, then winter. Maybe it’s that colleague who insists on writing a 25-page outcomes report for that 15-minute educational activity, squeezing out every last drop of picayune data because “it’s what funders expect.”
Sure, you could schedule time with a psychiatrist every week to talk through these issues, drop a couple thousand dollars each year, and perhaps get some clarity into how to deal with your professional nemesis. But in CMEpalooza land, as always, we have a FREE solution for you.
It’s our brand-new CMEpalooza Fall session – “The CME Advice Columnists.” What we’ve done is gather some of the smartest and most resilient people in our field, each representing a different specialty of the CME world — accreditation, outcomes, educational design, and grant development/partnerships — on an all-star panel to chew on that issue that is just really, really eating at you right now.
We all remember the dynamic duo of Dear Abby and Ann Landers. This is sorta kinda the same thing. You write us a short letter describing your issue, the mental gymnastics you are going through each day, and hopefully wrap things up with a question or two you’d like answered. Our panel then talks through their advice during our CMEpalooza Fall session.
Here is an example of a letter they might consider (as you’ll see, this clearly has no identifying elements that tie to any specific individual):
Dear CME Advice Columnists,
I have done a lot of work on this big event for a number of years in conjunction with another semi-prominent member of the CME community. Hmm, how do I put this gently? The dude is weird. He has this obsession with ’80s music, proudly and loudly tells everyone he meets that he’s “such an introvert,” and punctuates every conversation and email with the phrase, “Trust the Process.”
It’s not that this guy doesn’t have his redeeming qualities, but it’s becoming increasingly painful to have to suffer through his daily missives that clog my inbox. How do I politely tell him that he needs to keep our interactions more professional and focused on, you know, actual work?
Sincerely,
Trust the Results
Of course, these letters can be (and probably should be) anonymous. If you want to fudge some of the facts, that’s totally fine as well. But we do truly hope our panel can be helpful in solving some of the common problems that plague CME professionals.
Now here comes the hard part – this session won’t be a success without your help (well, unless you all want to hear about all of Derek and my issues). We’re asking our CMEpalooza friends — that’s you– to write letters to our advice columnists regarding whatever professional issue you are currently struggling with. Note that we specified professional issues. Your problems with your meddling mother-in-law are for a different forum.
Our submission form is below – again, since this is anonymous, I don’t want anyone to feel that you need to list your name or even send me an email. Really, we don’t care who the letters come from, as long as they focus on real-world issues that would be interesting to discuss.
Our audience did pretty well submitting questions for our no-holds barred interview with Graham McMahon, so we’re hoping you can rally again this week. We’ll keep this open until the end of September (that’s Saturday the 30th).
Have fun with this everyone. And thanks in advance.
CMEPALOOZA 