Center for Clinical and Translational Science

As a result of a three-year effort, partly funded by a CTSA Supplemental Award, The Rockefeller Center for Clinical and Translational Science (CCTS) created and published the initial results from their Team Science Leadership Initiative in the Journal of Clinical and Translational Science. Moreover, CCTS has shared the team science leadership competencies and companion survey with the CTSA Hubs at Columbia University and Yale University for their implementation and use. 

One of the primary goals of the CCTS Clinical Scholars Program is to help early-stage translational scientists mature into successful team science leaders.  As such, “leadership” (of their projects, of a lab, of teams, of peers, in the discipline) is an important construct tended to by their mentor, and by their senior professors, colleagues, and collaborators. Strong leadership is a crucial component of team science success. Thus, we believe that ensuring that our trainees are excellent leaders will help expedite the discovery process. After reviewing the literature and assessing the views of educators at Yale and the University of Pennsylvania, the senior leadership of the CCTS developed a series of team science leadership competencies, organized under five domains. The competencies were then included in a Team Science Leadership survey designed to help trainees develop and document the achievement of their team science leadership skills during the program. Entering Scholars complete a self-evaluation using the survey that helps them understand the competencies they need to develop to be successful team science leaders and to mark a starting point form which they can assess their progress during the program.

Mentors, Mentor designees. and senior colleagues use the survey to assess the current status of each Scholar across the five domains.  Leadership assessment results for each Scholar are combined across mentor and colleague ratings, and then are verbally (and in a written summary of the findings) returned to the Scholar by the Scholars’ Mentor, the Program Director, Dr. Sarah Schlesinger, and the program co-director, Dr. Barry Coller, as part of their progress review. The five essential Team Science Leadership domains include: 1. Foundational Leadership Competencies; 2. Professionalism Competencies; 3. Team Building and Team Sustainability; 4. Appropriate Use of Resources and Execution of Study; and 5. Regulatory Accountability. The Scholar independently assesses her or his attainment of the competencies and these ratings are compared to those of the Mentor and senior leadership. When there are major differences, these are discussed in detail. The goal is to use the survey results to stimulate discussion of the Scholar’s current status and to plot a course that will ensure that the Scholar feels that she or he has mastered the competencies by the time of graduation from the program. The results of the survey also help to identify ways in which to improve the program’s training in team science leadership as part of the program’s commitment to continuing quality improvement.