Sharon Pierson, graduated from Mohawk College’s Nursing program in 1986. She began as a general staff nurse, but over the past two decades has progressed in her career through the positions of, Cardiovascular Nurse Associate; Clinical Educator – Intensive Care, Clinical Manager – Cardiovascular Surgery, Neurosurgical, Trauma and Medicine Intensive Care Units. Currently she is the Director of Quality, Patient Safety & Clinical Resource Management (QPSCRM) at Hamilton Health Sciences, where she has had an integral role in the success of the program, which has been recognized with multiple provincial awards for excellence under her leadership.

In her current position, Sharon offers senior operational leadership by providing strategic direction and counsel to executive team members, senior leaders, physicians and community partners to make certain the collective objective of ensuring the right care is delivered at the right time, in the right place by the right provider, is achieved. She provides support to the QPSCRM management team and is directly accountable for approximately 200 staff.

Sharon’s commitment to quality care is ever-reaching as seen in her role as the current representative for “Council for Academic Hospitals of Ontario” (CAHO) on Ministry of Health and Long-term Care (MoHLTC) ECFAA Implementation Working Group. She has been the corporate lead of the 3-year RN scheduling initiative, with project outcomes including, the elimination of RN/RPN agency nursing staff use, sustaining reduction in absenteeism and overtime, and improving staff satisfaction with the achievement of MoHLTC from 70% of full-time RN staff to 30% part-time staff as well as achieving $1.4 million in savings. Sharon has also designed, developed and implemented a Clinical Resource Centre (CRC)model supporting centralization of high cost “purchased services” including patient transport and therapeutic surface rentals, which has produced a corporate savings, to date, of over $1.0 Million.

In 2010, Sharon organized the Hamilton Health Sciences Quality and Patient Safety Symposium, which had 500 people in attendance including staff, leaders, physicians, LHIN and community partners. She was part of the Death and Adverse Event Review committee which saw the implementation of multiple local and corporate patient safety improvements and was awarded the William Sibbald 2nd prize Award for Excellence in Patient Safety from the Ontario Government. She has also been responsible for the implementation of corporate wide, program/service based “Quality Councils” which serve as a point of focus for organizing people, information and action for improvement. As well as setting up automated dashboards, which monitor key metrics to facilitate evidence based decision-making.

Since graduating from Mohawk, Sharon has continued her love of learning and has completed a Bachelor of Science of Nursing from McMaster University and a Masters of Public Administration from Queen’s University. Sharon also is a committed Mohawk College Instructor for the Operating Room Certification Course. She believes her education from Mohawk College had a significant impact on her future achievements. She says, “the nursing program enabled the development of foundational nursing skills and competencies that allowed for future professional growth and success. At Mohawk College, I did not just learn how to “be a nurse” – I learned how to be: self-directed, to think critically, to ask questions, to find answers, to advocate and to be a team player. These skills were foundational to my future career achievements. My time at Mohawk also encouraged my continued path to lifelong learning – with the completion of my Bachelor and Masters degrees and multiple other professional certifications.”