The Immediate Past President

An Exciting, Challenging and Frustrating Year

Jack S. Broussard, Jr., DDS

Copyright 2002 Journal of the California Dental Association.

Following is the text of Dr. Jack Broussard’s outgoing president’s speech to the 2001 House of Delegates.

As I reflect on this past year, I would like to extend my heart-felt gratitude to all who have taken part in making CDA the best it can be. First, I must thank my beautiful wife, Abigael. Abby and I celebrated our 19th wedding anniversary in September. For 17 of those 19 years, our lives have been defined by the CDA calendar. During those 17 years, vacations have been missed or rescheduled. Family parties have been missed. Evenings and weekends have been filled with CDA obligations. Throughout those 17 years, Abby has never complained. Well, maybe a little. But she has always enthusiastically supported my involvement in organized dentistry. Abby, thank you for your love and support.

Leadership at CDA is a team effort. Steve Chan, Dennis Kalebjian, Debra Finney, Russ Webb, Kent Farnsworth, Jack Conley, and Sig Abelson together with Gene Sekiguchi and Tim Comstock are the best executive team ever. The Executive Committee is grounded in the belief that members come first. We continually strive to better represent our membership.

Communication has been an effective tool to share leadership responsibilities with the Board of Trustees and component leaders. The Executive Committee is dedicated to improving this leadership triangle.

I want to applaud the chairpersons and members of CDA’s councils and committees. I challenged them to experiment with a different way of conducting CDA business. I know how difficult and frustrating it was for them. It appeared to some that CDA did not need them any more. I asked them to decrease their budgets, meetings, and projects. They all stepped up to the plate and hit home runs. Their commitment allowed CDA to test two different governance systems, enabling us to evaluate the strengths and weaknesses in both systems. Thank you all for your leadership and resolve to do the best work possible.

To all who served on the task forces and integrated action teams, nearly 300 volunteers and staff, thank you for your inspiring enthusiasm and amazing ideas. In the short time the groups worked together, they have provided a blueprint for implementation of our applied strategic plan. Some groups met only once or twice. Some held several meetings in person, by e-mail, or by conference call. Your work has made a major contribution to CDA. You have allowed the Board of Trustees to better prioritize our goals. As you will notice in the strategic planning report, CDA goals have been reorganized into internal and external. This reorganization has enabled our executive director to model his staff to better accomplish our strategic goals. This is an important accomplishment. Thank you.

The Board of Trustees has worked above and beyond their job description. Each board meeting this year was filled with an enormous amount of work. Not only did the Board fulfill their usual duties, I challenged them to recreate themselves. They spent long hours learning the new language of applied strategic planning. They engaged consultants in order to learn new ways of conducting business. They evaluated the recommendations of councils, task forces, and CDA staff, carefully crafting priorities for CDA. They recommitted themselves to implementing our strategic plan, focusing on what constitutes the best service for our members. I thank the Board of Trustees for their friendship, their guidance, and their support during this past year.

One of the byproducts of the strategic plan is a recommitment of all the parts of CDA to working together to achieve our strategic goals. Much of the success of this renewed enthusiasm is due to our executive management team of Tim Comstock, Bob Witt, Fritz Knauss, and Rich Krolak together with 1201 Chairperson Tom Stewart and TDIC Chairperson Don Schinnerer. Thank you all.

The cooperation and working relationships between all parts of the CDA family are at an all-time high. The volunteer members of the Holding Company, 1201, and TDIC Boards of Directors have played major roles in defining our joint goals and vision. Thank you for your many hours of work.

Tim Comstock, our executive director, thank you for your perseverance and friendship. Tim and I made an effective team. Of course, at times, we both thought that we could do each other’s job better. Tim has been open and committed to his vision of our future corporate model. Tim has been criticized at times this year for his frankness. But he believes that the only way consensus can be reached and implementation can be successful is by completely open and honest dialogue from various viewpoints. Early in the year, Tim and I established our goals. Through steady hard work, we accomplished 90 percent or better of them. I have been asked, "Did we make the right choice in Tim?" After working closely with Tim this year, I can answer, "Yes, we did."

For all the hours CDA volunteers spend planning and directing CDA business, CDA staff spends an inordinate amount of time implementing our wishes. Not only do they put in their eight hours a day, they also work late into the evenings and on weekends to ensure our business is completed. They are committed to CDA and to organized dentistry.

This year, I challenged staff to embark on a new journey, a journey to implement the CDA applied strategic plan. It is a journey of uncharted roads, but a journey with a clear path to the future. I asked them to throw away our old maps. I asked them to reassess everything. I urged them to be creative. I insisted that they "just do it." I assured them that they are vital parts of the team.

Staff from all parts of the CDA family answered my challenge. They cut budgets. They ran two governance systems, thereby dramatically increasing their workloads. They struggled to clear old maps and create those new pathways.

They did all of this and more with enthusiasm and commitment. Even though at times, they must have thought I was nuts. The bottom line on our staff: I asked the impossible from them, and they always delivered. Thank you for all your hard work and commitment to the CDA vision.

This past year has been an exciting, challenging, and sometimes frustrating time for the California Dental Association. Beginning immediately after the 2000 House of Delegates, CDA volunteers and staff began the enormous task of creating objectives for and prioritizing the 19 goals approved in our applied strategic plan. I salute all who have taken part in this process.

I have been asked, "Did you accomplish everything you wanted to this year." My answer is no. However, as you can see in the applied strategic plan report to this House of Delegates, much has been accomplished. I also heard that some people believe CDA has stood still due to the strategic planning process. This is absolutely false. We are marching forward full speed with a clear guide, our applied strategic goals.

The new CDA Foundation is a reality. This is the direct result of successful implementation of an applied strategic planning goal. More importantly, the strategic planning process was followed. A need was identified. A study was completed resulting in a defined business plan. Implementation was achieved in a short seven months. Along the way, timelines and success indicators were established. Responsibilities were set and monitored. This successful achievement should serve as a model for all future CDA programs and services.

The new public awareness campaign "Smile California" has hit the airwaves. For those of you who have heard the radio spots or seen parts of the video on local news, I have not received any residuals, even though my new agent tells me I’m going to the top. She also told me to keep my day job.

We had an outstanding legislative season, with the governor signing the CDA-sponsored Chan bill, licensure by credential, and others. The Chan bill authorizes the state to investigate ways to decrease dental student debt. The signing of this bill was a major victory.

California becomes the 37th state to adopt licensure by credential. Our bill introduced by Dr. Sam Aanestad will not only allow qualified dentists to obtain licensure in California, it removes a barrier for other states to open licensing by credential for California dentists.

The resolution to support CalDPAC and issues funding is a direct result of the strategic planning process. After last year’s House’s rejection of a similar proposal, a task force was established under our strategic planning goals to reassess the need for increased funding in these areas. This task force of a cross section of members sees the need. I ask you to support this resolution. (Editor’s note: The House subsequently passed the resolution.)

Our baseline studies of allied dental personnel have been completed, while ongoing activities are occurring. This coming year, we will further develop and implement an effective recruitment plan. However, in my opinion, grassroots efforts are essential. As practitioners and business owners, we cannot throw up our hands and ask big brother CDA to fix all of our problems. I encourage you to personally talk to the directors of your local allied dental schools. Find out what the problems are. Offer to rally the local dentists to help. Did you know that the No. 1 reason given for poor recruitment and retention of allied dental personnel is low wages and benefits? No. 2 is a poor work environment. CDA cannot fix those problems. But we can. Did you know that some of our perceived successful allied training programs are struggling to fill their classes? Did you know that the directors of our schools want the help of the community dentists? We have lots of work to do. Let’s just do it.

Through our intensive work on access, CDA has truly become a respected voice in the legislative and regulatory arenas. Staffing our learning center and contact center is complete. Key individuals throughout the state will soon be developing a model of linked continuing learning opportunities.

Our corporate operations task force has made major strides in developing a new CDA corporate model that will ensure the continued success and growth of CDA and our subsidiaries. There are many other accomplishments.

There were several unexpected matters that required inordinate amounts of volunteer and staff time. The Proposition 65 and amalgam litigations commanded immediate, strong response coupled with hours of conferencing and strategizing. Failure to successfully solve these issues could have extremely damaging effects on our practices and on our patients’ health. The controversy surrounding the sunset review of the Dental Board was a major issue. It required effective consultation and negotiation with legislators, the Dental Board, the Department of Consumer Affairs, and the governor. Ongoing monitoring of the transition of a new Board will be an absolute must.

Through CDA’s work with the Legislature and governor’s administration on access for the underserved population, we are looked at as a problem-solver. CDA has won high marks for our recommended solutions. These are just a few of the unexpected but vitally important issues that stole time, resources, and staff from fuller implementation of our strategic planning goals. This is not an excuse. It is a reality. We must continue a steady course of implementation.

This is the BEST executive committee ever. I will miss the excitement of planning the meetings with Janice Johnson and Sig Abelson. But I look forward to the outstanding leadership of Steve Chan. Somehow each year, CDA manages to find just the right person to lead us to the next level. Steve Chan is the right person at the right time. As president, Steve will use his impressive analytical skills to enhance CDA’s effective presence in the daily activities of our members. Under his leadership, the implementation of our applied strategic plan will accelerate. The "Peter Principle" does not apply to Steve. Congratulations, Steve.

I end as I began, thanking you for allowing me to represent you as president of the California Dental Association.

As Janice Sugiyama states in her strategic planning report to this House of Delegates, "The hard truth is we have entered that part of the road where we are no longer what we used to be and are not yet what we will become."

Abby and I extend our love and best wishes as we continue our journey to "make CDA the best it can be."