The Academic Biomedical Career Customization (ABCC) program encompasses a set of initiatives to enhance, complement, and increase the use of current flexibility policies which are an integral part of faculty career advancement.

The elements of ABCC include: 

1. Career tracks where faculty plan their desired work distribution, progression and collaboration with their chairs, division chiefs, and teams.
2. Recognition of faculty contributions to university and academic service.
3. Sponsored Emergency Back-Up Childcare for Stanford Medicine faculty.

With support from the School of Medicine, the Stanford University Office of the Provost, and the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation in partnership with the American Council on Education, OFDD conducted a proof-of-concept pilot with a number of teams across the school in clinical and basic science departments. The main goals of this pilot were proof of concept, adaption of the model to the specific needs of each division, and assessment of short-term benefits such as career satisfaction and perceived productivity. 

The ABCC pilot program had positive effects on participants’ grant writing activities, improved participants’ perceptions of support from the university in the area of work-life fit, and increased global satisfaction with participants’ academic careers. In addition, four major principles emerged from the program that OFDD continues to incorporate in its programming going forward.

Build Awareness of Work/Life Policies
Career conversations can and should consider how available flexibility policies can be used to meet faculty work and life goals. By incorporating planning around career customization into faculty career development conversations, we can increase awareness around the accessibility of Stanford Medicine’s Stanford Medicine’s extensive work-life policies, which, in the past, have gone vastly underused. 

Transparency Surrounding Service Work
Faculty appreciate transparency about the type and amount of institutional service work they perform. The mere act of logging their hours of service work in a transparent way enables faculty to understand the proportion of their own time as well as their colleagues’ time that is devoted to these activities, and to feel recognized for their efforts that help the team and the institution.

Recognition of Service Work
The recognition of service work may go a long way to foster inclusion and sense of belonging. When faculty members are recognized in some way for the uncompensated service work they perform, they feel that ALL of their work activities are valued by their team.

Importance of the Micro-Culture
Most importantly, the ABCC pilot program made clear that all faculty development programs, including flexibility programs, need to be catered to the micro-cultures of individual teams, Departments, and/or Divisions. This insight has led to an entirely new approach from OFDD in all programmatic activities, recognizing the hyperlocal nature of team culture.