Strategic planning is based on the organization’s mission and vision and
outlines a plan to reach future goals (Oachs & Watters, 2020). The HIM
Director had to develop a strategic plan to unify the HIM departments at the
three hospitals. The HIM Director needed to determine the current state of
each hospital to identify issues to be addressed in the plan for a successful
unification of the departments. The strategic plan established a unified
mission and vision for the department and performance measurement
benchmarks. To ensure compliance, the plan also addressed necessary
changes for policies, procedures, and processes. It outlined the training
program to address compliance and cultural diversity training needs.
Project management can manage the necessary processes to achieve an
objective or goal, like the objectives outlined in the strategic plan (Oachs &
Watters, 2020). Project management was particularly helpful in managing
the compliance issues and training portions of the strategic plan. The HIM
Director selected stakeholders to create new policies and procedures to
address the compliance issues. The training was then developed to educate
the staff on HIPAA compliance and the new policies and procedures. These
processes needed to be completed in a specific order and within a particular
timeframe, so project management was integral in this part of the strategic
plan. A project management tool, such as the Gantt chart, can assist the HIM
Director in managing the training schedule for HIPAA compliance and
cultural diversity training to ensure the staff are trained within a specific
time frame.
Oachs, P., & Watters, A. (2020). Health information management: Concepts,
principles, and practice (6th ed.). AHIMA, American Health Information
Management Association.
