Program puts members of minority groups on inside track to professional careers
ASCENSION HEALTH
By JULIE MINDA
Fahad Tahir considers himself lucky that a minor infraction landed him in the counselor's office at Milwaukee's Shorewood High School in 2001. He was just in time to overhear a representative of INROADS describing how that program helps select students from minority groups land promising internships at local companies.
Fahad Tahir, center, converses with physician and faculty leaders at Ascenion Health's Providence Hospital in Washington, DC. Tahir said skills he learned in the INROADS internship program at Ascension Health's Columbia St. Mary's helped launch his career at the health system.
Recognizing a good opportunity, Tahir sought and received job preparation advice from an INROADS coach.
The summer before his sophomore year in college he had an INROADS internship with a physician practice unit at Milwaukee's Columbia St. Mary's. That internship led to a full-time position with the hospital while he was still in college full time. His work caught the attention of Columbia
St. Mary's parent company, Ascension Health, which accepted him into a leadership training program. At 29, he's vice president of physician enterprise at Ascension's Providence Hospital in Washington, DC.
Without INROADS, Tahir said, "I wouldn't be in health care, wouldn't be in leadership and wouldn't have the opportunities for professional or personal growth."
Bragging rights
INROADS selects interns who are high performing students, according to information from the organization, and it provides ongoing coaching on how to perform in professional roles. It also ensures interns have mentors at their workplaces.
"INROADS prepares them to come on board," according to Columbia St. Mary's Human Resources Manager Ray Herbert. He said INROADS interns are "exceptionally mature"; they work hard and they make a good impression on their colleagues.
"When people see these interns at work, and the positive impact they have, that gives a positive image of underrepresented groups," and that can lead to more awareness of the value of hiring minorities, said Herbert.
Columbia St. Mary's managers who supervise INROADS interns "talk about the success stories, and good news travels fast. As other managers see the benefit, they want to share that success" by hiring an INROADS intern.
Columbia St. Mary's benefits by having a recruiting advantage when these experienced minority students graduate from college and seek full-time employment, said Herbert. "Not only are we on their radar, but we are often asked by the students what opportunities exist upon their graduation. We also have access to students who are INROADS alum that are either not hired by their sponsoring company or are in a job search mode anytime during their career through our relationship with the INROADS account executive. They have an extensive network of alumni they will make available to us." Nearly a dozen INROADS interns have gone on to work for Columbia St. Mary's.
Affirmative exposure
St. Louis-based INROADS was founded in 1970 to "increase ethnically diverse employees in corporate management in the U.S.," according to information from the nonprofit's website.
Initially it enrolled high school and college students but now serves mostly college students.
Both in the U.S. and abroad, it matches undergraduate college students with companies with paid summer internship opportunities that align with the students' academic major and aspirations. INROADS employees in each of the organization's regions coach the students year-round on how to excel in the corporate environment and on what to expect in the careers they pursue. The intent is for interns to return to the same employer summer after summer and to receive a full-time job offer when they graduate from college.
Jesus Vasquez, senior manager of INROADS for the Great Lakes region that includes Columbia St. Mary's, explained that while INROADS originally only placed students who were members of racial or ethnic minorities, anyone now can apply. "But we look for the underserved (in terms of representation in selected fields). We focus on those without access to corporate positions."
Columbia St. Mary's has had about a half dozen interns per year since it started working with INROADS more than 15 years ago. The vast majority have been Asian, Hispanics and African American — groups that are underrepresented in the executive ranks at Columbia St. Mary's as well as in health care administration and physician ranks nationally, according to Herbert.
He believes the underrepresentation is not due to overt racism, but it may be a signal that hiring managers are "in their comfort zone, like everyone else. People are comfortable with people who are like them, so they may not go out of their way to hire people who are not like them. They may not go the extra mile to try to make a difference."
Getting inspired
Vasquez said another reason for the underrepresentation of minorities in executive positions is that academically talented people from less privileged socioeconomic backgrounds aren't always aware of the wide variety of careers available to them and the paths they can take to get into those careers.
That was true for Vasquez, an INROADS alumni who entered the banking field through his internship. He said he was interested in finance, but it wasn't until INROADS provided a mentor and coaching and exposure to banking that he understood exactly what a corporate position in banking entailed.
Jonquelle Jones, an undergrad at Milwaukee's Marquette University, said that when she started her INROADS internship in laboratory medicine at Columbia St. Mary's, she wanted to be a physician's assistant. But during her three summers at the hospital she was exposed to many other options for health care careers. Now entering her senior year, she is pursuing a public health career.
Jones said she learned to work independently and to take the initiative on projects. She has been told by managers in the community services department where she worked this summer that she'll be in the running should a permanent position open up after she graduates.
Jones said, "I don't believe that it's harder as a minority to get jobs, but (being with the INROADS program) is about inspiration. You are inspired to step outside of your comfort zone, to step outside of the shell and what you're used to doing — and to do what you may not have thought to do."
Columbia St. Mary's interns have taken on roles throughout the hospital, including as an emergency care technician, public relations and marketing associate, biomedical engineering technician, business office special projects coordinator, speech language and pathology worker, human resources assistant and pharmacy assistant.
Herbert said that there is a "domino effect" when a student interns in a professional role. "Relatives of interns see them coming to work here, and it can prompt them to act on their own interests," which generates new interns and job candidates for the hospital.
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