Episode 8: “Education is a powerful weapon”- Tiffany Channer

This week's Leadership Tidbits with Coach Tee Wilson features special guest, Medical Laboratory Scientist, Tiffany Channer.

As a highly accomplished woman in STEM, you can imagine that her resume is extensive, you would be right! Here are some of the major highlights you should know about the powerful Tiffany Channer.

Tiffany Channer currently serves as the Technical Supervisor for OneBlood, Inc. at Tampa General Hospital in Tampa, Florida. She honed her skill and knowledge of blood banking at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in New York, NY, where she completed her 9-year tenure as Blood Bank Educational Lead Medical Technologist III/ Safety Officer. During her undergraduate studies, she was a STEP/CSTEP mentor where she educated students of neighboring urban areas of Medical Laboratory Science.  Soon after graduation Ms. Channer was granted a life altering opportunity of being an American Society for Clinical Pathology / President Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief initiative consultant in Swaziland, Africa. After her experience there she pursued a Masters in Public Health with a concentration in Health Policy and Management and a graduate certification in Global Health. 

In 2011, Channer was awarded with the Medical Laboratory Scientist of the year Award for the Transfusion Medicine Department at the prestigious Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center. She has taught rotating Clinical Laboratory Science students and Doctoral Fellows theory and technical aspects of transfusion medicine. Tiffany also recruits for the Clinical Laboratory Science profession as a whole. As the American Society for Clinical Pathology (ASCP) Chair-Elect for the Council of Laboratory Professionals, Patient Champion Advisory Board Member, and Career Ambassador she educates, informs, and inspires students, seasoned scientists, and individuals within the STEM field about ASCP and its importance to the field. 

Channer lives by a Nelson Mandela quote. “Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world.” Her love of education permeates through her acts of service and she hopes to inspire and encourage future scientists to enter a field that is unfamiliar to many. 

While Ms. Channer was on the show, she took us through her often fast paced lifestyle of what it is like to work in transfusion medicine as well as simply working in the business of saving lives. She shared with us that life is so much bigger than working on the bench. She explained that can be used as a metaphor for a lot of things, but from the medical lab perspective she stated, “there's more to what we do than working on the bench, take time to know your team and for them to know you. As good leaders, it's very important for us to be accessible.” 

Overall here are some more leadership tidbits from Ms. Channer: Having a mentor is essential to your life and your progress, you need to have that person who is a champion for you, who's rooting for you, and who's exposing you to things that you didn't even know was possible. Lastly, nothing changes without policy and that's not limited to the lab, this applies to the context of the world.