As part of the development of Forging Ahead, UAB’s strategic plan for 2024-2028, UAB community members had the opportunity to give voice to a new set of shared values.
The result – We CARE – is an acronym to help students, faculty and staff remember, reflect and take pride in UAB’s shared values in an active way.
CARE stands for:
Collaborate: Work as a team for the greater good
Act with integrity: Be accountable and do the right thing
Respect all: Champion diversity and opportunities for all with civility
Excel: Innovate and strive for excellence in everything we do
We CARE’s primary initiative is to provide guideposts to ensure that all groups in the UAB community— whether faculty, staff or students—support and align with the same core values. Units that support faculty, staff and students will continue to develop programming to highlight UAB’s shared values and how community members can live them each day.
“At our core, our people are our most important resource,” said UAB President Ray Watts. “We aspire every day to actively live these values, which represent well who we are as an institution and as a community. They influence the decisions we make, the way we work and how we treat others.”
The Shared Values Committee of the Forging Ahead Strategic Planning Council was led by Associate Professor and former Faculty Senate Chair Mike Sloane, Ph.D. The committee took a comprehensive approach to the process, tapping into the 2023 engagement survey as well as previous UAB vision statements and those of other institutions. The committee then sought feedback from the UAB community that helped solidify the vision of We CARE.
“Our committee prioritized finding a way that our values could easily be shared and remembered by our community, which is what led us to the CARE acronym,” Sloane said. “Rather than focusing on outcomes or goals like the previous values, we wanted to create action items that would empower the UAB community. We made it a goal to ensure We CARE embodied the unique institution we all represent.”
UAB’s Modern Think engagement survey—conducted every two years as a vital way to determine and act on areas for improvement—largely informed the refresh of UAB’s shared values and the launch of We CARE. In the 2023 survey, questions sought understanding of the UAB community’s needs and values. Integrating community feedback from the engagement survey with the strategic planning process ensured that the new shared values both reflected stakeholder priorities and addressed UAB’s existing strengths and institutional identity.
“While simple and easy to remember,” Watts said, “We CARE captures what guides, inspires and motivates the UAB community to provide the world-class education, research and innovation, patient care and community service for which we are known.”
