Medical Center leadership answers the tough questions about what the elevate program is and what it means for the people who work at VMC.
Question: Recently, our department was asked to interview and potentially hire a “priority candidate.” Responses from those who've worked with her have raised questions about whether she is the right candidate for this position. Nevertheless, we are receiving pressure to offer her the position. How does this fit with our goals for recruiting and retaining the best staff?
Answer: While this brief question doesn’t provide many specifics about your situation, I certainly want to commend your determination to recruit and hire the best candidate for this position.
If HR referred a priority candidate to you, please be assured that there is nothing on record to indicate that this candidate's job performance is anything less than satisfactory.
Like other medical centers, VUMC seeks continually to improve productivity, and this means that sometimes the Medical Center has occasion to eliminate some job positions.
Priority job candidates are employees (or former employees) in good standing who, through no fault of their own, have seen their jobs eliminated.
Vanderbilt's policy of assigning hiring priority to these job candidates is fully in keeping with our goal to retain the best staff.
By definition, Vanderbilt priority candidates do not have documented performance problems.
— Lenon Coleman, interim chief human resources officer