Name: Shanika T. Silinzy
Position/Where: Transportation Supervisor, SSM St. Mary’s Health Center, St. Louis
Career Highlights:
Coordinates the safe transport of all patients to and from ancillary services and diagnostic testing areas; worked at SSM for 16 years and was developed by SSM into leadership roles; transportation is where I’ve started to gain experience to move into other areas; graduated in 2013 from SSM Emerging Leaders program
Recently promoted to corporate supervisor of patient business services, beginning September 8. Just accepted in Regional Business Council’s Young Professionals 100 Cohort for 2014-2015
Education:
Dual Master’s in management leadership and nonprofit organization management from George Walker School and Business and Technology at Webster University
Bachelor’s in business administration and leadership from Lindenwood University
Personal:
Previously married and raising one daughter
1998 Miss Harris-Stowe State University
St. Louis Connection:
Grew up in the Ville neighborhood; a third generation Sumner High School graduate
Journey to success:
I’ve always worked in health care. I worked at BJC in business. I was in the St. Louis Internship program early on in my life, so I’ve always focused in that business or leadership capacity. At BJC I worked as a computrition trainer… instead of doing manual menu selections, we started on an interface to electronic. That kind of forged my connection in health care.
I came (to SSM) as a traditional student. Once I learned the culture, I stayed on full-time, and since I’ve been here, I worked to collapse both my experience in work and my education to meet and get me to this point.
I am here to serve. As I move on and work upward in my career, it still helps me stay humble and in-tune with the community and the needs of the patients that we take care of. Being a supervisor of this type of dynamic, it gets me really in close proximity to the patients. And hearing, even when it is not incorporated, things we can do – it helps us to advocate for them and speak to the nurses about what we hear as we transport the patients to make it an overall pleasant experience.
I always knew I would be a leader. I wanted to be in health care management. I guess being a teenager coming in working in the health care…I loved serving patients so I am trying to find my niche within that is non-clinical.
My dream job would be vice president of operations.
I just really love SSM, the culture and the nurturing aspect of it. I am so in-tune with the culture, I would like to continue to be developed and seek my opportunities here. As a culture, I am comfortable but at the same time, I don’t think that I would be disappointed moving into higher executive or leadership role here because I know their overall strategy and mission.
