As chief of staff at the Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC), Jennifer M. Schlener provides strategic leadership to the Member, Learning, and Engagement and Office of the President teams. She supports and serves the President and CEO in his role in leading the AAMC to advance the mission of the AAMC. And as a member of the executive Leadership Team, she champions and supports the implementation of the AAMC’s strategic plan and organization-wide efforts.
As a strategic partner to the President and CEO, she convenes diverse teams to study and make recommendations as to how the AAMC should respond to issues affecting the AAMC and academic medicine more broadly. She recently led the exploration and execution of the merger of the Association of Academic Health Centers, including the Association of Academic Health Centers International, into the AAMC.
She oversees the functioning of the Office of the President, which includes the AAMC’s strategy and innovation development function and internal audit function. Her team supports the President and CEO, the work of the Board of Directors, the effective functioning of the executive Leadership Team, and the association’s presidential awards program.
Serving as an advisor on governance matters, she is responsible for the work of the Governance, Nominating, and Leadership Development committee of AAMC’s Board of Directors. She has spoken nationally on governance matters, including executive compensation, the imperative for board assessment, and continuous board improvement.
Ms. Schlener leads AAMC’s Member Learning and Engagement team, which ensures the AAMC meaningfully engages the broad academic medicine community to advance the mission of academic medicine by sharing information and practices across institutions, convening constituents through AAMC’s affinity groups, facilitating professional development for constituents, and providing leadership development opportunities.
Ms. Schlener demonstrates the characteristics of a servant leader and is a practitioner of relational leadership practices and brings enterprise-wide thinking to organizational complexity and change efforts. She drives and champions the alignment of culture, strategy, and leadership, and facilitates, and provides leadership to internal organizational development activities.
She is a highly rated speaker nationally, an expert facilitator of strategic and organizational development retreats, and is a certified trainer of Crucial Conversations and Crucial Accountability. She serves as faculty in the cohort-based Leading Organizations to Health relational leadership program.
Prior to joining the AAMC in 2007, Ms. Schlener worked at Penn State University for seven years, last serving as the Director of Development & Alumni Relations for Health Affairs at Penn State Hershey Medical Center and College of Medicine, leading the entire advancement team to advance the mission of the academic medical center. She began her career as a development and alumni relations professional at her alma mater, Franklin & Marshall College, in Lancaster, PA. An active volunteer, Ms. Schlener is the Past Chair of the Board of Directors of Physicians for Peace; Secretary of the Board of Directors of National Medical Fellowships; a member of Franklin & Marshall College’s Leadership Council; and she served as a past board member of the American Heart Association – Lancaster Division, Ephrata Performing Arts Center, and Hershey Area Playhouse.