Lessons learned from a distance-based consulting program to assist facultydevelopment projects

Changes in faculty roles and demographics necessitate a re-examination of t he types of professional development opportunities offered in academic inst itutions. A distance-based consulting program was designed to assist facult y development projects as they progress through all stages of faculty devel opment: needs assessment, project design, implementation, and, in particula r, program evaluation and dissemination of results (i.e., presentations and published articles). The progress of 17 faculty development projects in pr imary care educational sites that received assistance in the United States and Canada was tracked over two years. Three factors were identified as hav ing the most impact on the success of faculty development projects: (1) fun ds committed to and designated for faculty development; (2) funded, protect ed time for at least one person to implement the faculty development initia tive; and (3) an environment capable of supporting faculty development init iatives (e.g., no major budget shortfall, few faculty transitions, a strong mission, no threat of mergers). Only a few of the participating sites reached the stage of evaluating and p ublishing articles about the Outcomes of their projects within the designat ed 15-month time frame, with many sites reporting environmental impediments to project success. The authors describe the institutional characteristics that facilitated project Success, assess the usefulness of distance-based Consulting efforts, and offer recommendations for future distance-based con sulting programs. They conclude by noting that the personal touch (i.e., on e-on-one contact with consultants) is what is most appreciated, and that ex cellent one-on-one, m-person assistance may be inherently more effective th an even the best-run distance,based consulting.