3 Understand and function within the chaplain’s institutional culture and systems, including utilizing business best practices appropriate to one’s role in the organization.
OL 3 will share some of the same overlaps as OL 1. The competency demonstrated here is that you can take one of the systems within the hospital, understand the culture within that system, and embody best practices for managing something within the system. Bonus points for detailing how you improve and influence the culture of the system.
Organizations have huge potential for change at the same time that they have high resistance to change. One effective method for this competency is by getting on various committees your hospital has. I have been on a handful of committees with the most memorable one being a committee where each department had a representative. The meetings were filled with moments of effective interdisciplinary work.
In a different example, we have a robust volunteer department and this includes staff volunteering at events in various ways. One of these is a bed-building ministry for children in the county. After completing the event one of the coordinators asked if I could offer a prayer which I happily did. The prayer encouraged the hearts of the co-workers who had volunteered and placed their service in the bigger picture of enabling dreams for kids both literally and figuratively.
For more comprehensive reading on this competency read the latter chapters in Chaplaincy and Spiritual Care in the Twenty-First Century. For more resources specific to chaplains in organizations see Marketplace Chaplains including their helpful write-up on the benefit of Chaplains during workplace conflicts.[1]
[1] Marketplace Chaplain, “The Valuable Role of Chaplains in Workplace Conflicts and Privacy,” Media, modified September 22, 2023, https://mchapusa.com/the-valuable-role-of-chaplains-in-workplace-support/.
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