Evolution: advancing the environmental health professional step by step.

Let me start this edition of the President's Message with a personal reflection. This spring, I went through one of those life-altering experiences that help mold us. The kind of experience I am referring to would include things like suddenly realizing that you are a graduate and need to find a job, marriage, the birth of a child, the loss of a loved one, and so forth. For me it was my father who had to face open-heart surgery, which ultimately had a very positive outcome.

Prior to the surgery, with the thought of the potential outcomes ahead, this event gave me time to reflect on how much influence Dad had in shaping my life and the successes I'd had in life. I was reminded of a book that came out a few years ago: All I Really Needed to Know I Learned in Kindergarten, by Robert Fulghum. It is amazing how many of the basic skills of life are learned at an early age. I learned from my father that it is important to be honest, reliable, conscientious, and hardworking, and above all to treat people as you would want to be treated in the same situation. These were the lofty things my father instilled in me, but there were also tasks and skills--things like fishing, hunting, building, mechanics 101, and farming, and the list goes on endlessly. Those were the fun things we did together.

After the surgery, I was able to correlate the principles I'd developed in childhood to the principles I'd picked up in the early years of my career. You all remember that first day at the new job, full of enthusiasm, when you were ready to change the world with all the newfound knowledge you had gleaned over the past four years of education or the experience from the previous job? What was it like for you? Were you encouraged to utilize the enthusiasm to take your employer's services to a new level? Or were you encouraged to slow down so that others "would not look bad to management"? So where is your enthusiasm now? Some of the work we do relies on the guiding principles you bring with you that you learned early in life. Work ethic, sincerity, and honesty would be examples of these guiding principles. I like to think of them as things that can't be measured in a test but that are shown through our actions.

The tasks that were passed on in the early stages of my career were primarily to observe a few inspections in a particular program to learn "how we do things in this department" because that was how they were always done. You have to remember, I entered the environmental health field when the environmental health degrees as we know them today were first evolving. In many of the programs, as you might imagine, my perspectives on "how we have always done things" were different from the department's perspective. This is where I learned patience. What I learned is that if you want to effect change, you do so either by revolution or by evolution. Since I was on the low end of the totem pole, I chose evolution, and that takes time. Little by little, I saw changes occur, and I have to admit that I changed, too, in that "the way we do things" was not all bad. Compromise is a wonderful commodity. Henry Ford once said, "Coming together is a beginning. Keeping together is progress. Working together is success."

So how do these observations relate to NEHA? As I stated in my last column, one of my goals when running for a position on the NEHA board was the recruitment of students into the field. At this point we (NEHA) have developed what I think is a pretty good long-range strategy for accomplishing this goal, and, as a bonus (which I did not conceive of happening), the strategy encompasses the whole issue of workforce development. It addresses not only the recruiting of students into the field but also the training and transition of professionals moving into leadership positions. Not everyone desires to move up the organizational chain, nor is there room for everyone entering the field to be placed in leadership positions. But up to 50 percent of the aging environmental workforce, many of them in management, will be able to retire in five to seven years, so it is imperative that we begin now to train and mentor the younger professionals for these leadership positions. It is my desire that some or all of the taskforces that are currently working on workforce development issues will have a product to share at the San Antonio Annual Educational Conference in June of 2006, and I encourage all to come and listen.

In the meantime, what can we do? Let me give you a couple of suggestions. First, don't turn down any opportunities to speak at elementary or high school classes, at community or college career days. Who knows what minds you might touch and inspire to select a career in environmental health? The topic you probably know best is "Why I Chose a Career in Environmental Health."

Second, take the time to mentor the young professionals in your department or affiliate (and encourage them to join NEHA like you). Try to move the enthusiasm in a positive direction.

Third, try to rekindle the enthusiasm you had when you first entered the field.

In closing, is there anyone out there who is striving for mediocrity in their profession or job? If so, you are probably retired but have failed to notify the human resource or personnel department. Thomas Edison's view was "Show me a thoroughly satisfied man and I will show you a failure." Putting our best foot forward as a profession will be to the benefit of all environmental health professionals, and with the troubled times in our profession, we need that effort from all now. We can't continue to be satisfied with the current state of our profession and survive the future we face. I would encourage you to join me, the rest of the board of directors, and the NEHA staff in the "advancement of the environmental health professional."

Ron Grimes R.S., M.P.H., D.A.A.S.

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