Director, Indigenous Cultural Safety & Quality

Job Summary :

In accordance with the Purpose, Vision, Values and Coast Salish Teachings, and strategic directions of PHSA, safety, including both patient and employee safety, is a priority and a responsibility shared by everyone at PHSA.

As such, the requirement to continuously improve quality and safety is inherent in all aspects of this position.

The Provincial Health Services Authority (PHSA) plans, manages and evaluates selected specialty and province-wide health care services across BC, working with the five geographic health authorities to deliver province-wide solutions that improve the health of British Columbians.

PHSA embodies values that reflect a commitment to excellence.

Reporting to the Executive Director, Quality, Patient Safety & Experience, and matrix reporting to the Executive Director, Cultural Safety & Transformation, the Director, Indigenous Cultural Safety & Quality provides strategic leadership and strategic guidance with a focus on addressing and eliminating Indigenous specific racism.

The Director works in partnership with leaders across PHSA to assist in the implementation, co-ordination, and evaluation of PHSA strategic plans and specific initiatives by providing Indigenous leadership on embedding Indigenous specific antiracism and Indigenous cultural safety into the organization in areas of quality, patient safety, and experience across PHSA.

The Director will support a visionary, innovative, and creative approach to Indigenous health by developing, fostering, and maintaining meaningful, respectful, and collaborative relationships with PHSA leadership, and external health partners, including Indigenous health partners / communities.

The Director, Indigenous Cultural Safety & Quality, in partnership with the PHSA and Program Indigenous Health teams, works closely with the Quality, Patient Safety & Accreditation Directors and Patient Experience Directors and their teams to identify and assess needs, and drive the development, implementation, and evaluation of Indigenous-specific antiracism and Indigenous cultural safety initiatives and programs within PHSA.

The Director, Indigenous Cultural Safety & Quality provides strategic leadership to a core team of program managers who provide frameworks to assess individual, team, program, and organizational capacity, and measures of the current state of Indigenous cultural safety, as well as guidance on best and Wise practices and knowledge integration, web resources and guidelines, and recommendations for policy development.

The Director, Indigenous Cultural Safety & Quality partners with the Program Quality, Patient Safety & Accreditation team in facilitating reviews of Indigenous-specific racism and discrimination that has caused patient / family harm to identify system improvements to ensure the care provided by PHSA programs and services is experienced as culturally safe and anti-racist and well as to facilitate meaningful resolution and restore trust when possible.

The Director, Indigenous Cultural Safety & Quality develops and implements a spectrum of engagement opportunities including consultation, collaboration, and empowerment with PHSA program and service leaders to advance the transformation of organizational culture to ensure safe and more equitable service delivery for Indigenous patients / families and staff.

The Director, Indigenous Cultural Safety & Quality will also establish reciprocal and collaborative relationships with Indigenous partners, Ministry of Health, Regional Health Authorities, Colleges, Medical Affairs, and Academic Affairs in the development and execution of strategies to improve the health of Indigenous people and their families in British Columbia.

Duties / Accountabilities :

Provides strategic leadership and accountability for the planning, alignment, actions, and evaluation of services within the portfolio to advance Indigenous cultural safety of patients / families and staff.

Ensures consistency with various strategies and recommendations, including, but not limited to, PHSA’s overall strategic plan, Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples Act, Truth and Reconciliation recommendations, PHSA Indigenous Health strategy, PHSA’s Integrated Quality & Safety Strategy, the First Nations Health Plan, the Tri-partite Health plan, and provincial mandates regarding Indigenous cultural safety and humility training.

• Develops and maintains key partnerships with relevant health agencies, educational facilities, and Indigenous communities and groups.
• Leads portfolio service development and planning activities through working groups and projects, and monitors the progress and outcomes achieved.

Creates, implements, and evaluates objectives, policies and procedures, and standards of cultural safety practice related to patient care in partnership with key partners across PHSA.

Establishes strong working relationships and partners internally with PHSA-wide Programs and Services to develop and operationalize strategies and plans to improve local and organizational systems and service delivery for Indigenous clients.

Takes a leadership role in developing, implementing, and evaluating the strategies such as policy, quality and human resources that support Indigenous cultural safety by promoting evidence-based best practice as well as Wise Practices grounded in Indigenous ways of knowing and being.

• Compiles, analyzes, summarizes, and communicates data to support program initiatives. Evaluates whether program objectives / milestones are met.
• Provides strategic insight and context with the Indigenous cultural safety and humility education and training content, quality and safety, patient experience and partnerships, research, measurements, evaluations, and data.
• Facilitates Indigenous-specific racism and discrimination reviews that have caused patient / family harm with the goal to achieve meaningful resolution when possible and identify and implement system improvements that eradicate Indigenous-specific racism and discrimination.
• Applies expert knowledge of the Calls to Action of Canada’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission, the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP), the National Inquiry into Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls Calls for Justice (MMIWG) (2019) and the findings and recommendations of In Plain Sight to ensure reviews are managed in alignment with the guidance and recommendations made to address Indigenous specific racism and discrimination.
• Provides Indigenous thought leadership on how to form partnerships with Indigenous patients and measure patient experience in a way that is experienced as culturally safe.
• Partners with Quality, Patient Safety & Accreditation teams to lead the implementation of the Health Standards Organization Cultural Safety and Humility Standard and related system transformation.
• Assesses the impact of transformational initiatives using a systems approach and manages the impacts and interdependencies of cross-divisional and cross-Program and Service projects.
• Oversees the development of operating and capital budgets and, as required, cost pressure and business case submissions.

Responsibilities include identification of service and budget priorities, allocation of resources, program development, planning of goals and objectives, coordination of service delivery systems, and establishing and monitoring of targets and indicators.

Oversees all aspects of human resource management within the assigned portfolio, including the recruitment, selection, orientation, performance management, and termination of staff as required.

Looks for opportunities to support individuals with lived experience to develop their knowledge and capacity to work in a provincial health authority context.

Ensures culturally appropriate supports are available to Indigenous staff.

Identifies and pursues opportunities for supporting new activities and improvement initiatives. Performs other related duties as required.

Qualifications :

A level of education, training, and experience equivalent to a Master’s degree in a relevant health care profession and a minimum of seven (7) to ten (10) years of recent related progressive leadership experience, including five to seven (5-7) years of organizational change management experience and at least two (2) years in a managerial / leadership role;

and if applicable, current registration / membership with a professional college.

• Demonstrated extensive knowledge of Canadian colonial impacts on Indigenous people in social and health contexts, supported by significant knowledge of Indigenous ways of knowing and being.
• Demonstrated extensive knowledge of social, economic, political, and historical realities impacting Indigenous communities and advanced knowledge of Indigenous Cultural Safety and anti-racism and accompanying reports (BC DRIPA, TRC, In Plain Sight etc.).
• Knowledge and appreciation of the unique history, cultures, and rights of Indigenous Peoples in Canada; well-developed understanding of Indigenous Cultural Safety, white supremacy, and anti-Indigenous racism.
• Lived experience with Indigenous populations and demonstrated extensive knowledge of Indigenous health care needs, services, and issues as well as knowledge of culture, protocols, traditions, and ideology of Indigenous people and organizations in British Columbia.
• Demonstrated relational skills, including effective facilitation skills and / or applying effective conflict negotiation / resolution skills, including Indigenous circle processes, and bringing in an Elder / Knowledge Keeper as necessary.
• Awareness of and commitment to learning and understanding the Truth & Reconciliation Commission’s 94 Calls to Action (2015), In Plain Sight Report (2020), BC's Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples Act (2019) and Reclaiming Power and Place Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women & Girls calls for justice, and how they intersect across the health care system.
• Demonstrated facilitative leadership skills, analytical and problem-solving skills, and a proven ability to foster a collaborative team approach to decision making.

Considerable creativity and problem solving to manage direct and indirect opportunities.

• Ability to prioritize and manage multiple tasks and projects.
• Exceptional communication, interpersonal and public relations skills.
• Proven ability to negotiate and mediate resolutions to complex situations.
• Ability to interact tactfully and effectively with staff at all organizational levels both internally and externally.
• Ability to establish courses of action for self and others that are results oriented.
• Demonstrated ability to relate effectively to a variety of people from diverse backgrounds.

Pursuant to Section 42 of the British Columbia Human Rights Code, preference will be given to applicants of Indigenous Ancestry.

We invite applicants to self-identify within a cover letter and / or resume.