It’s an organization with more than 600 employees, but it’s hard to find anyone at The University of New Mexico Sandoval Regional Medical Center - A Campus of UNM Hospital (SRMC) who doesn’t know Sandi Ceglar.

For many, it’s probably because she hired them, or because she’s made it a point to get to know them.

Ceglar is the manager of talent acquisition and development on SRMC’s human resources team. For the past four years she’s been recruiting and hiring people to work at the community hospital in Rio Rancho.

 

I love it here. Our incredible leadership team has created a culture that truly is about taking care of our team, our patients and our community. 

Sandi Ceglar, Manager of Talent Acquisition Development, SRMC

“I love it here,” Ceglar said. “Our incredible leadership team has created a culture that truly is about taking care of our team, our patients and our community.”

Ceglar also leads the hospital’s gratitude committee, which is dedicated to creating monthly events to make the SRMC team feel appreciated.

“The people on the gratitude committee do it for the same reason,” she said, “because they love the people here and they want to make an impact on them in a positive way.”

Before coming to SRMC, Ceglar spent 25 years as a higher education recruiter for various schools throughout New Mexico. Her job was to get people, including health care workers, to come back to school to pursue higher degrees in education.

“I would visit hospitals to recruit employees to come back to school – mainly nurses, but any health care worker who was interested in going back to school,” Ceglar said. “I also provided professional development opportunities for health care workers.”

Now, at SRMC, Ceglar said it feels like her career has come full circle

“The best part of my job is still connecting with people in the community,” Ceglar said. “It was an honor to help them pursue their education, but to now actually be able to bring them into the career they want, I absolutely love it.”

As a Level III trauma center, SRMC provides critical care for patients living in Rio Rancho, Sandoval County and surrounding Tribal communities. And as a campus of UNM Hospital, those communities also benefit from SRMC’s partnership and collaboration with the state’s only Level-I trauma center and New Mexico’s primary teaching hospital.

Ceglar said her job is finding the right people who are dedicated to high-quality and safe patient care and who are looking for a team-centered environment.

 “We’re looking for someone who wants to work at a hospital where people care about each other and they can work together to take care of our patients,” she said.

In a world where the demand is high for health care workers, Ceglar said it’s SRMC’s culture that truly sets it apart. It’s why she wanted to join the team.

“When I came on, it was during the pandemic and I had to interview with five people over Zoom,” she said. “At the end of the interview I asked them all what they love about SRMC and they all gave me their stories about the culture and why this is a special place to work. That’s five people with different stories but, ultimately, the same answer.”

Ceglar said she was sold. She took the job before she had ever seen the hospital.

“I live in Albuquerque,” she said. “So, I have to drive 30 to 40 minutes to get here, but it doesn’t matter, because I love the people here and the people are dedicated to taking care of patients and the community.”