Department of Surgery Communications Director Marissa Keppley, MBA, recently presented her capstone project for the UAB Blaze Academy.

Keppley, alongside her team presented “Improving Communication through CrowdSourcing.” Their presentation suggested that UAB leadership consider utilizing Spark–a crowdsourcing platform currently only used by UAB IT–across campus for solving moderate to complex problems, or even simply sharing ideas.

The capstone presentations took place in the conference center of the Hilton at UAB hotel. From graduate program directors to seasoned faculty, there was a diverse group of leaders from around UAB present.

Blaze Leadership Academy is the UAB Learning and Development Office’s flagship program for high potential faculty and staff. Designed to support leaders who wish to grow and contribute more to UAB, the program includes developmental assessments, opportunities to build relationships with colleagues across UAB, and learning experiences centered around UAB Shared Values and Leadership Expectations.

Keppley found the nine-month program extremely beneficial to her growth as a leader.

“Blaze Leadership academy brought leaders from across UAB together– who would not normally interact with one another– to collaborate and come up with innovative ideas while we learned and grew together,” said Keppley. “It was a wonderful opportunity to further my own professional development and UAB network.”

Nominations for the 2022-2023 cohort begin in July 2022. For more information and to nominate, visit the UAB Blaze Leadership Academy website.