Assignment -

Imagine that you are a part of the leadership team at Gulf Coast Hospital, a leading cancer treatment center. Upon reviewing the hospital's financials, you realize that they have been steadily declining over the past few months. After some research, you learn that a competing organization, Bayfront Healthcare, has assembled a highly qualified cancer treatment team that is using new technology to treat cancer patients. They can now offer noninvasive treatments with a faster recovery time, which is quickly making them an industry leader. How might you and the leadership team respond? How will you differentiate Gulf Coast Hospital and regain control of the market?

As this scenario demonstrates, health care leaders must be aware of external environmental factors that might adversely impact organizational performance. From competitors with new technologies to legislation, the economy, and decreased reimbursement rates, leaders must identify and respond to external factors through strategic planning.

This week, you examine external environmental factors of organizations and consider their impact on strategic planning. You also explore strategies to limit the influence of external factors on organizational operations.

Learning Objectives -

• Identify external environmental factors of organizations
• Evaluate the impact of external environmental factors on strategic planning
• Recommend strategies to limit influence of external environmental factors on organizational operations

Assignment Topic: External Environments

Accountable health care leaders must respond to external factors in a way that is advantageous for the organization and the community. While health care organizations must strive to improve their financial positions, it should never be at the expense of the populations they are serving. For this Assignment, examine the following scenario and consider strategies to limit the negative impact of external factors and improve organizational success.

Scenario: A small independent hospital in rural Georgia is seeking to attain Magnet Status. This designation demonstrates to stakeholders that the organization is committed to delivering high-quality patient care. With this designation, the organization can easily attract and retain a highly-engaged clinical staff. Moreover, it provides the organization an opportunity to market itself to potential patients as the place to receive top-quality care. This means that the organization could realize a greater market share of insured and private pay patients traveling as far as 100 miles just to receive the quality services. It also positions the organization to enter into joint ventures with physician groups eager to provide new services, which would lead to increased revenue streams.

Although the designation sounds like a great opportunity for the organization, the board of directors is split on their support of this designation. The board members in support of the designation understand the great value that this program will bring to the facility; however, those in opposition learned from a research study that non-magnet hospitals had better infection control and less post-operative sepsis. They also learned from another study that working conditions in a magnet facility are not better than those in non-magnet facilities. Therefore, the dissenting directors have concluded that the organization should not invest its time and resources to seek this credential. The CEO must get support from an overwhelming majority of the board to move forward with pursuing this designation.

To prepare: Review the provided scenario and consider external environmental factors that may impact the organization's strategic planning (e.g., policy and economics, laws and ethics, health care quality, and population health).

Note: Your Assignment should show effective application of triangulation of content and resources in your conclusion and recommendations.

The Assignment - In a 2-page executive summary, do the following:

• Identify and evaluate the impact of external environmental factors on the strategic planning of the organization in the scenario.
• Recommend strategies to address these external factors and limit their influence on organizational operations.