FIU Strategies for Sustaining Change in Healthcare Organizations Discussion Questions
) Imagine that you are a first-line manager of a department in a relatively small hospital located in a semi-rural area. For many months there had been rumors of a possible merger with another semi-rural hospital half again the size of yours located about 12 miles away. Both administration and the board of directors had been declining to comment on the rumors although it was apparent that some kind of negotiations were underway. In about mid-November all managers were officially notified that the merger would take place effective the first of January. The two hospitals were to become a single corporate entity with two locations, and functions and services would be consolidated wherever practical. Describe in detail the possible effects of the merger and all that it entails on you and your position.
2) It is stated in the chapter that the three ways of getting employees to implement change are: Tell them what to do; Sell them on what must be done; and Involve them in determining the substance and direction of the change. For each of the three means, describe an instance in which it is a preferred or even essential approach and an instance in which it is an inappropriate or perhaps even harmful approach.
3) If you were hiring a new employee in your work unit, how would you rank the importance of the following qualities? That is, how much weight would you assign to each in making your decision? Explain.
Personal values (ex. work ethic and integrity)
Individual intelligence
Conscientiousness in performing the job
Some employers use integrity tests as part of the screening process. Are there problems with integrity tests? Can you test for integrity?
If you were a work unit supervisor, which of the following do you think is more important to improving organizational performance? Explain.
- Encouraging employees to participate in work and organizational decisions
- Setting clear, challenging work goals
As a manager you realize the supervisors who report to you make errors when they rate their employees (e.g., too lenient, rate everyone the same, etc.). You notice a consultant is offering a training session on how to avoid appraisal rating errors. How successful do you think such a course would be in eliminating these errors?
- As a supervisor, if you asked or surveyed your employees about the importance of pay as a factor in making job decisions, do you think employees would over-state or understate its value to them?
