What Do Your Delegates Do Between Annual AHIMA conventions?

Written by Joy Knowles, 1st year Delegate

AzHIMA currently has 5 delegates that attend the yearly AHIMA House of Delegates (HOD) session. This session is conducted on the Sunday before the convention. It is an all day session that encompasses the summation of the previous year’s activities. There are 6 house teams that meet 6 times during the year. Each team has specific duties and “charges” that are component of the strategic plan of AHIMA. The dead line date is the next year’s convention. The teams meet via teleconference, winter and summer team talks plus the leadership conference.

AzHIMA is a CSA (component state association) of AHIMA. The board members that you elected to run your CSA have local, state and national responsibilities and assignments. The tasks are disseminated among the board members. These tasks are the essential elements of the strategic planning for AHIMA. AHIMA depends on its 60,000 members to direct and guide the association and communicate needs for recognition of the profession. Recruitment and retention of membership is a crucial part of this plan. AHIMA BOD and staff strive to meet the needs of the membership.

AHIMA members must reciprocate by being an active participant in piloting their AHIMA career path. This is necessary to accurately represent the AHIMA credential. Volunteering at the local, state and national levels offer great opportunities to each member to grow in the career path of their choice.

The structure of the association consists of the board of directors of AHIMA, AHIMA staff, CSA boards and members at large. The HOD represents the membership and the purpose is to communicate national issues to state members and voice the concerns of the CSAs to the national level. The HOD assures this communication ability and covers the issues through specific “Teams” or “work groups” which divide and categorize these in the following themes. These teams are:

1. Best Practices/Standards.

2. House Operations.

3. Volunteer and Leadership Development.

4. HIM Higher Education and Workforce.

5. Environmental Scan.

6. Professional Development and Recognition.

The 6 themes include many of the same issues and concerns but from different angles and viewpoints. The environmental scan group collects the concerns of the members, students and employers. The team focuses on the customer, geophysical, political and social trends in the industry. The HIM higher education and Workforce is charged with recruitment of students from the AA through PhD level degree students. The team provides support for clinical practice sites, academic network of programs and faculty and increase the number of HIM educators. The Professional Development and Recognition team identify the learning needs of the HIM professional and assist in the development of resources to promote the value of the AHIMA credentials. Volunteer and Leadership committee’s focus is to increase the number of qualified active volunteers. Leadership development and recruitment of new members is being addressed with recruitment Video, power point presentation on the advantages of volunteering and purchasing of the Franklin Covey leadership webinar. House Operations Team is assigned to do the review of bylaws and Roberts Rule of Order. The team is also responsible for conducting training for delegates. The Best Practices/Standards team collaborates with practice councils, ethics committee and develops HIM practice guidance and professional guidelines.

The COP for these house teams contain detailed information from meeting minutes to presentations and publicity material. If there is any difficulty with obtaining these materials from the AHIMA web site please let me know. I will be happy to retrieve the information for you. The list of resources is extensive. This is a sample of what is available to you:

• Letters to employers on the benefits of a HIM credential professional

• Student survey results from 2010

• Membership survey results from 2010

• Webinar explaining survey completion.

• Flyers, pamphlets and posters for promotion of the HIM profession.

• Governance power point on the HOD, BOD and AHIMA association guidelines.

• Benchmark Data Comparison

• By Law amendments

• Updated Code of Ethics

• ACE presentation and materials to obtain this designation

• Volunteer recruitment Video

• Power point presentation on volunteering benefits.

• Course Share Learning Packet on volunteering.

• Nomination Criteria

• Application for a BOD, fellowship or ACE volunteer position.

• Campaign Guidelines

• Product development

• AHIMA and AzHIMA face book web addresses.

The 6 teams will meet once more before the summer team talks. At that time, the collection of agenda items for the HOD is formulized. Further work on the issues will be done between summer and fall. Currently this year’s HOD will be addressing changing of the governance of the association and the profession, codes of ethics and marketing of the profession.