Leadership, Planning & Evaluation

Duke University, Durham NC

Investigators

Linked publications, trials & patents

Abstract

Duke Cancer Institute’s (DCI) senior leadership provides strategic oversight, decision-making and advice for cancer-related activities at Duke University and Duke University Health System. DCI senior leaders are a distinctive group that prioritizes and promotes research productivity, investments, and recruitments; endorses interaction and collaboration; takes maximum advantage of institutional strengths; assures community involvement; and fosters unique scientific opportunities through a robust committee structure. The DCI Executive Director actively seeks and fosters the opinions, feedback, guidance and advice from senior leaders, who have expertise in operational, clinical and scientific subject matter, to plan and execute priorities and initiatives. These priorities, investments, and initiatives are codified in the DCI Strategic Plan. Led by the Executive Director, the DCI 2022-2027 Strategic Plan benefitted from considerable input from DCI senior leadership and members as well as broad internal and external advisory groups. Effective planning and evaluation are carried out on an ongoing basis through multiple internal and external advisory groups across the DCI. Examples of DCI accomplishments resulting from robust planning and evaluations over this grant period include the following: 1) A rigorous and comprehensive strategic planning process leading to a reorganization of DCI research programs to optimize scientific productivity, collaboration and translation; 2) Strategic recruitment resulting in one new Associate Director: Community Outreach and Engagement (COE), as well as several new Program Leaders, with the number of women leaders increasing from 13 to 18 (↑38%); 3) Strategic recruitment of 52 faculty, including several high-profile, nationally renowned priority recruits; 4) An extensive internal and external review of DCI Shared Resources resulted in two being redistributed; 5) Launch of COEE and Cancer Research Training Education Coordination Research (CRTEC) Program Liaisons; 6) Implementation of pilot awards specifically designed to meet the needs of DCI’s URM faculty; 7) Improved clinical trial activation timelines (↓25% to PRMC approval, ↓77% to institutional approval, and ↓38% to PRMC approval to trial activation); and 8) Influenced policy initiatives with North Carolina and federal legislature addressing cancer control issues and Medicaid expansion. The success of these planning and evaluation activities are demonstrated in the DCI’s growth in key metrics of performance over this grant period: total grant funding (DC) increased by 29% to $146M, NCI funding grew by 33% to $37M, and total peer-reviewed funding increased by 30% to $90M. The evidence of collaboration is noteworthy, with a 71% growth in multi-investigator funding, from to $34M. Guided by its strategic plan, the DCI will continue to use its planning and evaluation committees, supplemented by ongoing feedback from all internal and external advisors and stakeholders to achieve its goals of: 1) Discovery and Translation; 2) Growth and Impact; 3) Training and Workforce Development; 4) Quality and Experience; and 5) Reduce gaps in health outcomes.