Deja Shelton

I have been in the healthcare field of operational excellence and leadership for about 13 years, spending most of my time at Emory Healthcare where I've grown from the front lines into leadership. It's been a pleasure to be able to lead people and see people grow, where I can support them as well as learn myself and understand different interests. As a leader, I understand how applications work, lead projects, and use data and analytics to make decisions in improving our internal processes. I work to be not only the example needed, but also to work in the front lines with my team so they can see their leader at face value, so they can see that I am a part of them, we're one team, and titles don't matter. Originally, when I went to Alabama State University, I thought I wanted to be a physician - my major was biology, pre-health, and I wanted to be a pediatric cardiologist. But as I got into the corporate world and started getting into communications, my interests changed, and I was really focused on being in the behind the scenes of how patients receive care. I loved how I was able to be in the contact center, to be that first point of creating that patient experience, so I just stayed with Emory Healthcare from then on. I was also born in Emory Healthcare, so everything made it full circle of why I cherish patient care, why I'm passionate about leading my team, and why I'm passionate about giving the best service I can.