Physicians, staff pitch in to help BIDMC weather the economy
Donations, sacrifices pare potential layoff list
Date: 3/26/2009
BIDMC Contact: Jerry Berger
Phone: 617-667-7308
Email: jberger@bidmc.harvard.edu
BOSTON – Buoyed by an outpouring of goodwill and shared sacrifice from staff and physicians, Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center will be able to significantly trim costs and reduce the number of employees who will lose their job in the current economic downturn.
The economic game plan developed by President and CEO Paul Levy after a series of 11 “town hall meetings” with staff, shrinks potential layoffs from 600 to less than 140. The plan includes a temporary freeze in wages, matching 401(k) contributions and adjustments in vacation accrual. The plan exempts the medical center’s lowest-paid workers – housekeepers, transporters, food service workers materials handlers, drivers/couriers, mailroom assistants, patient observers, and unit assistants from the wage freeze.
Employees have launched an effort to support their colleagues, helping staff to quickly and easily make a gift in support of the hospital. In its first hours online, the fund received nearly a dozen gifts, including a $500 gift from a nurse.
The medical center’s staff effort was joined by 13 chiefs of the clinical departments, who collectively accepted pay cuts of $350,000 to create a Physicians Support BIDMC Fund. The chiefs who do not technically work for the medical center, but instead are employed Harvard Medical Faculty Physicians at BIDMC – encouraged their physician colleagues throughout the medical center to join the effort.
Similarly, the employee fund has received numerous gifts from the public, including a $500 gift designated as a “Cure for Layoffs” from a generous donor who was inspired to give after reading an editorial about BIDMC in a local newspaper.
In his letter to the BIDMC community, Levy commented on the impact that philanthropy can have for the institution’s immediate needs.
“Donations to the hospital can also help avoid layoffs. For example, the $350,000 in funds already committed by the chiefs has already saved about 10 jobs during this fiscal year,” said Levy. “We try our best to plan our lives and live carefully and frugally, saving for future contingencies. Then, an earthquake-like phenomenon occurs, a massive disruption in our economic system that shakes the very foundations of decisions about consumption, savings, and personal security.”
As an added incentive, Levy and his wife Barbara vowed to personally match gifts made to the Fund (www.bidmc.org/giving) through April 10 at a rate of $1 for every $10 donated.
