BY JAMIU BUSARI (@JOBUSAR)
Dr. Holly Caretta-Weyer [MD, MHPE] Clinical Associate Professor, Emergency Medicine; Associate Dean of Admissions & Assessment; Stanford University School of Medicine; Senior Scientist, The PEARL (e): hcweyer@stanford.edu
Dr. Holly Caretta-Weyer is Clinical Associate Professor of Emergency Medicine at the Stanford University School of Medicine, in California. She finished her basic medical training at the University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health in 2013 and did her residency in emergency medicine at the University of Wisconsin, in 2016. Dr Caretta-Weyer is a senior scientist at the Precision Education and Assessment Research Lab (PEARL) and also a medical educator, having obtained a master’s in health professions education from the University of Illinois – Chicago in 2020. In 2024, Holly was appointed Associate Dean of Admission and Assessment at the Stanford University School of Medicine while she continues to perform her work as an emergency physician. Regarding her work as a clinician, Holly enthusiastically says, “I practice emergency medicine (EM) by day or night (24/7/365 really). It is truly the greatest specialty of all. I never know what I’m going to do or see on a given day, and I have the privilege of being there and taking care of people on the worst day of their lives”. She considers EM a specialty that is truly a team sport, “no real hierarchy, everyone working together and doing their best for the patients. I genuinely can’t stand hierarchy so this has always made so much more sense to me”.
Dividing her Time
Dr Caretta-Weyer distributes her time across her various clinical, teaching, research, and administrative activities. Her response was that at this stage of her career, 30% of her time is clinical and 70% is administrative and research. “I am an associate dean for admissions and assessment, so I spend a great deal of my time pragmatically working on our medical school’s admissions and assessment portfolios. Right now, this means developing a situational judgment test for admissions and revamping our clerkship assessment process to be longitudinal and competency-based. According to her, her administrative task is actually quite exciting and collaborative across a ton of stakeholders, which she loves. On the research side, Holly is leading a national effort to implement competency-based education in emergency medicine and focusing her scholarship on the assessment and selection aspects of training across the educational continuum. In her words, she says, “Honestly, most of my career can be summed up in tackling things from an admin and research perspective that keep me up at night and/or give me a great deal of rage as I find them to be done poorly in most contexts.”
When asked how she enjoys the diversity in her career, she responded saying that the best part about being a clinician educator and having such a diverse array of roles or hats is that when you feel like you are really in the soup with something, perhaps the research has gone sideways or there is a really sticky administrative issue, there is always the clinical work to fall back on. This always brings back joy and fulfillment. Or vice versa, when clinical work brings you stress and angst, you can lean into research or working with learners. “The variety oddly keeps me sane!” she says. Holly firmly believes that clinical work informs administrative and scholarly work, and vice versa, which gives her credibility when working with learners.
Managing difficulties
When asked about the challenges associated with diversity in her role as a CE, Holly responded, saying anyone who tells you it is easy and has no challenges is “full of it.” It is really difficult to “get it right,” particularly when you reach a position of leadership. Managing teams of people and high-leverage initiatives is always going to be challenging. Add to that balancing family and hobbies (in her case, keeping up with baseball and soccer as well as getting outside regularly and crocheting tiny animals), which she needs to do in order to maintain equilibrium; it can be a lot! “I have become religious about working with my team to manage my calendar. I now block 1.5 days per week for my research/thinking time and for taking a break. I’ve become a bit zealous about seeing a movie by myself every other week just to clear the deck and do something for myself,” Holly admits though that despite all of this, she still works after everyone goes to bed for a bit. “That is because I am a night owl by nature and do my best work in the late evenings.” Knowing how you work best and being vigilant about protecting time for the things you care about while also communicating that to those who need to know on your team is essential. On the flip side, especially when you work with staff who have normal hours, it’s key to communicate that you may work weird hours. However, you shouldn’t expect them to do so and will do your best to time your emails and Slack messages for the next day.
Three tips for junior CEs:
- The first tip was one she was told by Esther Choo when she was a first-year faculty member, and she has stuck by this religiously: When deciding if you should say yes or no to a new opportunity, ask yourself:
- Does it fit within my niche or portfolio of interests?
- If I found myself awake at 2 AM working on it, would I not be mad about it?
- Do I get to work or collaborate with cool people that I want to spend time with?
- (Relative) Does my chair really want me to do it?
The first three ideally need to be a yes. The fourth one is only used if needed as a tie-breaker, and you don’t always need to say yes, even if your chair wants you to do it.
- You can’t make everyone happy, you’re not pizza! When making decisions, sit down and identify your core values or principles. If you can make decisions from that set of values or principles every time, even if it’s not a decision that everyone will agree with, they will at least get where it’s coming from even if they don’t like it.
- Lean in to things that frustrate you or where you think you can make a difference. I swore I would never do assessment work, and now look at me! You can make an entire career out of becoming an expert in something that drives you nuts and that you firmly believe can be done so much better. Don’t be afraid to walk through doors that open, even if it’s borne out of your angst about something. Oftentimes, mentors will see things in you that you may not see in yourself and provide opportunities you didn’t see coming!
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