For this assignment your role is as a consultant for a strategic planning firm that Middleville Healthcare has hired to help them with their strategic performance, specifically in the areas of Human Resources, Information Technology, Financing, and Marketing. As a member of the Consulting team, are asked to make some recommendations about the strategic direction Middleville should take. Begin by reading the background on this HCO and its competitors, and then answer each of the questions comprehensively but in a straight forward manner. The assignment will also require that you use at least three quality resources. You can use our current or former textbook as a reference, and Strayer’s online library (Resource Center tab) to seek out peer-reviewed, professional references. Simple google lookups are not considered to be quality sources, unless they direct you to more professionally written sources as mentioned above.
The assignment itself can be found in the Course Guide link, and will also include another link to its grading rubric. I will use this rubric to grade your papers. I also encourage you to review the feedback I gave you on the first writing assignment so that you have a better sense of how I will evaluate your responses to the questions.
Writing a well-organized, grammatically correct, college level paper that answers questions specifically and thoroughly can be a challenging task. However, it is extremely important to be able to communicate your thoughts in writing, staying focused on the question, and responding in a concise manner. If you are unsure of your writing skills, please take advantage of the many resources Strayer U. makes available to you. If I mentioned in your first paper that your grammar and writing skills needed improvement…this means you!
Within the Tutoring Tab, you can find Grammarly.com, a free, automated grammar tool. And I highly recommend using the Virtual Writing Center in which you can work directly with a writing professor. They have actually set up using a separate BB shell, but it is easy enough to enroll yourself and seek out their help. I am attaching the directions for enrollment here for you. Depending upon the day/time you want to meet online, writing professors rotate who is on-call, and you can find all of their information in the Writing Space BB shell. Again, I will offer extra credit on your paper if you use the Virtual Writing Center’s services. If you do so, email and let me know once you submit your paper. Remember also to proofread your paper! We all make typing mistakes as we think and write at the same time. Read it over several times. Do your sentences make logical sense?
Below I list each of the questions and then give you some additional advice about how to answer each one. The assignment says you should rank your issues in importance, but you don’t have to worry about that. Just answer the questions in order, providing a subheading for each question, and it will be fine.
- Explain the governing board’s role in these strategic initiatives, determining its responsibility and involvement.
This question asks about the Board’s role in promoting and monitoring strategic initiatives. Remember that the Board operates on a very high level and leaves the detail of running the various departments in the organization to the CEO and other management personnel. Think about the Mission, financial solvency, etc. You should research this question to understand the Governing Board’s role.
- Evidence-based management means that operational and strategic decisions are made based upon the evidence that goals and objectives are actually being met. Quantitative measurements must be identified and measured. This data is then used to evaluate the HCO’s performance. Name three (3) performances Middleville can use to measure its success in providing quality healthcare to the community, and identify quantifiable, measureable indicators that can be used to do so. Explain the importance of each performance measurement.
Once you identify 3 key performance dimensions of Middleville’s overall performance, remember to include exactly how you would measure if the institution is successful at these. Don’t just repeat how important each performance is; think about what data you could use to determine if you are meeting your goals? If this question sounds similar to that which was asked in the first paper, you’re right, it is. And just like in the first paper, it is important to describe measureable outcomes that will help the HCO to assess if it is meeting its overall performance goals.
- Given the statistics of Middleville and its two (2) competitors provided in Table 1, recommend to the HCO what areas it should focus on to maintain its competitive market share as well as continue to provide healthcare to the community in the 21st
**Please note that Admissions is an annual number, while Census is a daily number (the number of beds filled on a particular day). Also, the dollars are in the millions.**
There can be many different answers to this question and many different ways of looking at Middleville and its competitors’ statistics. I suggest you look at the numbers in the chart to determine which service types (segments of the patient population) Middleville uses the most and therefore should focus their efforts on. Should it improve upon what it’s already doing or change strategies all together? As a consultant, you can be creative, but also be realistic. You can’t do everything for everybody, all for free. Anything that seems to make sense is all good.
- Some of Middleville’s Board members are very interested in pursuing advanced technology systems over the next five (5) years, while others are concerned about the enormous expense and need assurance that the investment in technology will be worthwhile. In both monetary and process terms, describe the costs and benefits associated with implementing EMR and associated health data systems. Lay out a plan for how various systems can be implemented.
You are asked to consider both the costs and benefits of implementing an EMR system. As for the benefits, think about how you might ‘sell’ the idea of an EMR system to the Board, that is, why is it necessary and how will it help the organization? Think in terms of time, resources, and money as far as the costs are concerned. (You don’t have to be specific about the dollars.) Although the question asks about ‘various systems’, limit your thinking to EMR systems.
- Middleville has faced many challenges in recruiting and retaining nurses and other clinical employees. The economy has hit the area very hard and budgetary limitations have reduced the amount of money available for salary increases. The Board knows it needs to provide other benefits to their valued employees. Provide at least two (2) suggestions to Human Resources to promote employee satisfaction and, therefore, retain experienced personnel.
Think about benefits that you consider to be important. What increases your satisfaction on a job? Given their budgetary limitations, what other options could Human Resources pursue to promote employee satisfaction?
