Interview Report

The Task: The task in this assignment is to arrange and have an interview with a person working in a leadership role in health care services and prepare a report - see the task description below.

Objective: Students will undertake an interview with a person working in a healthcare system leadership role and prepare a report on the outcomes of that interview in line with learning module material in the course.

Task Description: Arrange to interview someone working in a leadership role in a health care or services organisation or setting.  The purpose of this interview is to find out about the leadership traits and characteristics of the person you are interviewing and to gain some insight as to how they may have been developed or shaped in their career etc.

You should make all the arrangements for this interview which would need only to be about 30-40 minutes duration.  Some issues to consider in making your arrangements:

• you must tell the person the purpose of your interview and that you will be writing an assignment report on the interview and your findings - you need to ensure the interviewee consents to this interview on those terms
• if possible arrange a face-to-face interview at mutually convenient times etc but if necessary a Skype interview might be an option - affirm again at the beginning of your interview that you are conducting the interview as part of your report writing in this assignment
• you might know someone in an organisation you are associated with (e.g. ward manager; imaging manager; chief medical technologist; director of nursing; mental health services team leader; director operations; community health team leader etc etc etc) or you might arrange an interview with someone you have not met before (helps build your network of contacts and enables you to meet people working in areas of health that you might not be familiar with)
• you can, of course, de-identify the name and identity of the person you interview when you prepare your report

Use material covered in Module 3 of the course to develop appropriate questions and an interview line or approach to find out about/from your interviewee:

• what traits and characteristics they feel they have in their leadership style
• what factors (e.g. personality, situational, learned etc) influenced, affected and emerged those traits and characteristics
• any issues or aspects of leadership traits and characteristics they think leading in the health care environment are important, difficult, need to be developed etc

Prepare a report on your findings and relationship to the literature and learning from this course.  Develop an appropriate framework or approach to compare and contrast your findings from interview to the traits and characteristics outlined in the literature that we have looked at in this course.  Include in your report discussion on your findings; learning; and any issues related to traits and characteristics of the leader in a healthcare environment. Refer to appropriate literature to support your analysis and findings.

Remember, if appropriate, you can de-identify who your interviewee was in your report.

The format:  The format of your 'report' document can be any appropriate format (e.g. essay style; report style; case study style etc etc) you think appropriate for this task but you should include the following headings into your format:

• Introduction
• Methodology (includes detail of leadership role; type of organisation; how interview was carried out; reference to questions used etc etc - de-identified where necessary or appropriate)
• Results/Findings (main outcomes from the interview)
• Discussion (short discussion from outcomes of the interview and relationship to literature etc)
• Conclusion
• References