Northern Health (NH) strives to make our values – empathy, respect, collaboration, and innovation – the core of what we do every day.
The Dr. Charles Jago Awards, named after our former Board Chair, acknowledge and celebrate the NH staff, physicians, and teams who have made outstanding contributions to the organizational goals, reflecting our values in the process.
The winner under the “Collaboration” category for 2022 is Dori Pears, Regional Manager for Primary and Community Care. Dori played a pivotal role in launching Northern Health’s Virtual Primary and Community Care Clinic (VPCCC), which was created in the early days of the pandemic, and initially known as the COVID-19 Online Clinic and Information Line.
Helen Bourque (Regional Director, Nurse Practitioners) and Pam Mulroy (Executive Lead, Primary Health Care) shared the following about Dori:
“Dori has prioritized building trusting relationships across the region. She has drawn on these, navigating multiple perspectives always with the goal of finding common purpose/aim in alignment with the principles of the [Virtual Clinic]. Dori provides stability and clear vision to her team, drawing on her teams’ expertise and strengths to contribute to the evolution of the service. Dori has created a learning environment, where feedback is valued to inform improvement.”
Sarah Boyce (Primary Care & Virtual Clinic Coordinator) enthusiastically added:
“It’s hard to put into words what an amazing experience it is working with Dori Pears. When asked to write about her collaborative efforts, there are many examples.
The Northern Health Virtual Clinic was born within 24 hours as a response to the COVID-19 pandemic and required rapid thinking and collaboration to set up this call centre for Northerners to access COVID-19 testing and resources. This set up required working with multiple technological systems and programs that existed in communities to ensure that communication was able to be sent back to the person’s community.
Virtual care in a health authority as large as Northern Health requires out of the box thinking and collaboration, in order to meet the needs of our rural and remote communities. Dori has an exceptional ability to build relationships within her team; they feel comfortable sharing their knowledge and experiences, which has allowed for collaboration in creating and further expanding the Virtual Primary Care Clinic.
As the pandemic evolved, the Virtual Clinic has been called on to support a number of new programs and services, and services that other departments required support for. Dori has never said “no,” she always asked “how” something can be implemented. She has always been open to discussion, collaboration, and seeing how the Virtual Clinic can support. Although always willing to support other programs and services, Dori is always collaborating and consulting with her own team to ensure that they don’t burn out or feel overwhelmed.
Whenever the Virtual Clinic has seen increases in calls and demands for client care, Dori can be seen working alongside the team, always asking where/when she can help. Dori leads the team through honesty, collaboration, and integrity. She can often be found coordinating with the team on how things can be done better for Northern and other health care teams. There is no work that Dori feels belong to one member of the team – we all work collaborative to get the job done.
Team building and collaboration are some of the pillars that Dori builds her teams on. She is always collaborating with subject matter experts to ensure that her staff are supported. She is continually sending out interesting information to her team to encourage forward thinking. It’s evident that Dori does not just “talk the talk,” she “walks the walk.” Dori can always be found in the office with her door open to staff at all times – she fosters an environment in which staff feel comfortable sharing ideas and frustrations. Dori is able to identify staff strengths and passions, and then is able to utilize them in current and future work.
In our opinion, there is no better candidate for a Collaborative Jago award than Dori Pears. She encompasses everything that collaboration stands for.”
Congratulations to Dori and thank you for being the embodiment of Northern Health values!
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