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Inside Health Professions is a new series that profiles faculty and staff in the Faculty of Health Professions. The goal of this series is to shed light on the many roles within the FHP that contribute to the success of our students and researchers and to the attainment of overall academic goals.

She’s only been in the role for two years, but by all accounts she is doing a fabulous job. Joanne Tortola is the Physiotherapy School Administrator, a role that she says touches on “every little area of the school.”

Dr. Anne Fenety, Director of the School, says Joanne had a tough act to follow. “She followed an administrator who had been with us for 20 years. There was a high expectation for her to come in and do everything Judy had done,” says Anne. And she did just that: “walked in, stepped up, started going.”

A Day in the Life

Joanne’s role as School Administrator has involved her in a wide variety of projects and tasks on the operations side of the school, including financial planning, budgeting, organizing some of the renovations taking place, and human resources.  All of the staff report to her directly and she’s a support person for many school level committees. To top that off, she’s also instrumental in event planning for the school’s upcoming 50^th anniversary.

Because her role covers a wide range of responsibilities, every day is different. “It’s a lot of meetings and there’s always little projects to work on,” she says.

Last year, Joanne and other faculty and staff at the school worked on finalizing the process of accreditation, which occurs every 7 years.

“Joanne was key to the accreditation process,” says Anne. “Accreditation involves every aspect of running the entry-to-practice program from how we bring students in to how they do 3 years into a job, the School’s governance, and how we manage the program.” Calling it a huge task would not do it justice.

The board responsible for providing Canadian universities feedback from their submitted documents was very impressed by the web-linked format, according to Anne. The format allowed for links to be inserted into the web document for easier readability and movement through the site. Anne credits this to Joanne: “Dal was the first to do a web-linked version of the accreditation notes of all the universities in Canada, and that is thanks to Joanne.”

Joanne admits that she loves seeing a project through to completion and says, “Seeing the school succeed in that way was good.”

There are 8 other school administrators for the various programs under the Faculty of Health Professions and Joanne says, “Everyone brings their own skills to the table”.

Paving the Way

Joanne obtained her Bachelor’s degree in Commerce from Dal and then became an office administrator for PCPC, a computer retailer on campus that recently closed.

While working at PCPC, Joanne says she was fortunate enough to do her Master’s in Public Administration part time.

After a couple years at PCPC, Joanne worked as an administrator in Dal’s office of International Research and Development (then known as Lester Pearson International) before switching to the private sector for a couple years at a health research consulting company, a role that she says “taught her a lot about the health care sector”.

Missing Dalhousie, she applied for her current role. “It’s a good fit,” she says. “I love planning in general and finding new ways to do things. It’s like a puzzle you’re trying to work out.”

Overcoming Challenges

“Most of the challenges I work with surround resource constraints,” Joanne says. “There’s always budget constraints and potential budget cuts to plan for.” Figuring out where to make cuts is one of her biggest challenges. “Salaries make up most of our budget, and it might seem like the most logical place to make cuts, but it’s not. The staff have supportive roles, and with such a small school we just couldn’t function without them.”

Aside from budgeting, space issues are also an ongoing struggle. She works with the Registrar’s Office and several other schools to try to arrange teaching and examination spaces for Physiotherapy classes.

Joanne is thankful for the opportunity to collaborate with other schools on projects and credits Shelley Colbourne in Occupational Therapy, Coleen Van Loggerenberg in Nursing and Wanda Dundas in Pharmacy for being “a great resource for questions and trouble-shooting space issues.”

High Praise

There is no shortage of praise for Joanne. “She really has been one of the most positive, refreshing changes in the school,” says Anne.  

Prior to Joanne’s arrival, the school had wanted to put its lecture series into podcasts but there seemed to be too many barriers. “Within a month of her walking in the door, we were webcasting,” Anne says.

Joanne has also worked with Jocelyn Adams, the school’s communications and special projects assistant to develop a school newsletter and other communications mediums. Jocelyn, too, only has praise for her boss: "Joanne is a backbone in the School of Physiotherapy. She provides endless support and innovative ideas to faculty, students and staff. It's been a pleasure to work with her - I'm always learning from her experiences."

Anne continues to say that Joanne handles all the obstacles with grace, she’s not afraid to ask questions and “she’s developed a nice network within the university.” She’s great at finding solutions to problems the school faces, says Anne, “I call her Detective Tortola.”

However, Joanne accepts praise humbly, “It’s a supportive role and you have to remember that. You’re here to support the faculty and the school. That’s also what motivates me to come to work every day – I work with staff who are knowledgeable in their area of expertise, (admissions, clinical education, IT, communications), faculty who are collaborative and supportive, and a Director who exhibits true leadership qualities.”

Although she is responsible for a lot of work behind the scenes, students also recognize her helpfulness. “Students are happy to go talk to her. They know that she will help,” says Anne. “She really goes out of her way for people.”

Know of a staff or faculty member in the FHP who regularly goes above and beyond in their work? Want to see them profiled in Inside Health Professions? Email Laura Hynes Jenkins with your suggestion.