RESPONSE PHM-06

Response one PHM-06

Organizational and strategic planning is critical for any entity or program in healthcare and public health. Managers and leadership teams should use strategic planning for their organizations and programs, addressing how they will manage resources and lead team members. Strategic planning includes goals, objectives and action steps needed to achieve the program or organization’s mission. It utilizes a step by step process with measurable variables, assessing how the organization will be effective, and look at how it will change over time. This is also applicable to programs.  A component of this strategic planning is the evaluation of the organization or program, and the continuous assessments help to identify gaps, so recommendations can take place.  Recommending solutions to health issues, or solutions to organizational and program issues helps to enhance policy making processes. Program planning and policy making processes are dynamic and so recommendations change based on many factors of internal and external environmental changes.

       Strategic planning promotes population health improvement.  The step by step processes employed include identifying specific health issues during the needs assessment period and so a health program is developed, to meet these needs, where goals and objectives are set. Strategic planning considers internal and external factors and with a public health program, this helps to identify gaps in a program, or issues that could arise during implementation of the program. My final project is looking at the needs of an underserved rural community, and this rural hospital’s goal of increasing its services and transitioning to an electronic medical record. The management team must consider their stakeholders, technological resources and equipment, geography, cost analysis, population health needs, feasibility of providing for these needs, and the socio-economic and health behavior status of the community they serve. Can people afford the services, do they have transportation to the facility, can they afford the technology if wanting to utilize telemedicine for example?  Strategic planning is essential in this case because many internal factors such as staff willingness to change, management competence, available financial resources and staff skills set affect the outcome. External factors to consider during the strategic planning is workforce and economic changes, additional funding for the transitions needed, infrastructure of the community and distance from vendors. Is the program or changes feasible?

Strategic planning improves population health through program evaluation tools because of the continuous assessment of a program to see if it is meeting its goals, if not, recommended solutions are implemented; and there is constant performance measurement of the program and program managers. I have no experience with this in public health but in a hospital I worked, I observed how the leadership strategically unfolded the plan for our transition to a new EMR; from the training of super users who in turn trained us, to the dates of trial and full conversion, to the reassessment to see if we were comfortable with the software and how this affected patient care and organizational flow. They constantly assessed every aspect of the transition from start to finish to ensure staff competence and satisfaction, to organizational flow, patient care and any affected patient outcomes.

Response two_06 PHM

Strategic planning is an organizational management movement that is used for priority setting, strengthen operations, making sure that both employees and stakeholders are working together towards one mutual goal. Agreements are established upon projected on outcomes and assess as well as adjusting the organization's direction in response to a changing environment (Balanced Scorecard Institute, 2017). It is also a disciplined effort that produces vital decisions and actions that defines an organization, who it assists, what it does, and why it does it, with a focus on the future (Balanced Scorecard Institute, 2017). Effective strategic planning articulates not only where an organization is going and the actions needed to make progress, but also how it will know if it is successful (Balanced Scorecard Institute, 2017).

I’ve never developed a strategic plan before but if I were to. My organization would decide itself when the time is right for a strategic plan.  It is sometimes easier to describe when the time is not right than when it is. When a crisis arises it should get resolved promptly, rather by acting strategically, and then begin planning. If something minor happens however, usually the organizations will begin strategic planning.  My organization would observe and recognize when clients are changing, consequently, changes will be prepared to be made. After the engagement of strategic implementation are taken place, there are a few steps that are initial steps to be followed deciding to engage in strategic planning, the organization should take the following initial steps. List some of the main issues that face the organization, Decide when the plan should be adopted, Set aside some time for the planning process,Decide if a facilitator would be helpful, Decide who should be involved and how they should be involved in planning, finally, find a place for the planning meetings to occur.

Most important, strategic planning for public health begins with an understanding of the needs of a specific population, their disease burdens, and the associated interventions (Phelps et. al, 2016). Strategic thought and planning are followed by practical action, which included commitment, execution and accountability. In health, it is defined as the feeling, practices, and metrics for changing the future state of the organization   (Shi & Johnson, 2014). If strategic thought is the plan for the journey to reach the final destination, tactical action is the journey itself, including the mechanism for getting there (Shi & Johnson, 2014). Tactical action requires commitment within the organization, execution of the plan, and finally, accountability within organizational leadership. Electronic Medical Record is crucial due to the improvement of the population health by storing medical information for many years, accessible throughout the country (Richard, 2010). When recommending ideas relevant to the hospitals operations, it is important for management to plan how the recommendations are to be carried out as well as the costs. Although the cost of training and implementing the EMR will need a large budget, it is however one that is worth investing in. It is also important to note that EMR have been seen to reduce medical errors, because the computerized system has an order entry system that enhances patient safety eliminating medical errors, and patients are able to receive medical results faster, overall bringing in more customers and money.