Calendar Memorial Hospital

Calendar Memorial Hospital is a 750-bed general hospital located in a large industrialized city of the Midwest. The hospital employs approximately three thousand people.

You have been employed at Calendar Memorial Hospital for five years. You were hired as an administrative assistant; two years later you were promoted to the position of assistant administrator of general services and very recently to assistant administrator of professional service.

You are looking forward to your new assignment because it is consistent with your career goals and ambitions. If you can effectively improve the existing professional service, you are sure of consideration for the number one position when the present administrator retires in approximately four years. Even if you are not selected for this post at Calendar, you are confident that you could become administrator at a similar institution if you so desire. However, everything hinges on the successful completion of your new assignment. On your recommendation the hospital has decided to combine the individual departments of physical therapy and rehabilitation therapy into a single unit. This decision was made in response to several factors. First, patient volume has increased 17 percent in physical therapy and 23 percent in rehabilitation therapy over the past two years. Future patient volume projections indicate increased activity in these areas. Second, since both areas with like patients, they have similar problems, use similar items, and can be more efficiently operated under one budget. Third, the two areas are located adjacent to each other, and combining staff members under one management is a logical step. Fourth, the administration wants to ensure an efficient work flow from one area to the other, and finally, administration wants to maximize the amount of employee substitution within these two areas. (The department of physical therapy employs ten therapists, six physical therapy assistants, four porters, and one scheduling clerk. The department of rehabilitation employs five therapists, three therapy assistants, three porters, and one scheduling clerk.)

Up to this time the two units have been managed by two separate department heads. Unfortunately, in spite of the common goals these two areas share, they are antagonistic toward each other—blaming each other for scheduling problems, patient mix-ups, uneven work flows, etc.

You are asked to recommend one person as department head for both units. This individual will report to you, but your recent promotion will force you to spend the majority of your time and attention on other professional services. You are fully aware that the wrong individual in this position could create some serious problems in both areas. Therefore, you want to select the best possible candidate because it will not only affect the departments involved but will also contribute to your future effectiveness. After considerable deliberation, you have decided to recommend either Mary (the department head of reha­bilitation therapy) or Tom (the department head of physical therapy) for the new position.

Mary: Mary, age twenty-six, came to the hospital three years ago, immediately after completing her occupational therapy program at a nearby university. While somewhat inexperienced as a department head, she has demon­strated managerial ability and leadership potential. She was the first occupational therapist hired when the hospital introduced by an O.T. program, and she was very instrumental in developing the program to its present size and capacity. She has a definite flair for developing strong interpersonal relationships with her employees and patients, and her patients are always well attended to in spite of an ever-growing work load. Her employees are willing to assist each other with assignments, and the department has adopted a philosophy of "When one person works, we all work; when the work is done then we all can relax." There have been times, however, when you felt Mary could be more formal with her subordinates. For example, minor infractions of the rules are sometimes allowed to go "unnoticed," and Mary frequently spends a disproportionate amount of time with the work schedule attempting to accommodate everyone's special requests for "time off."

Tom. Tom, age forty-seven, is a registered physical therapist with twenty-three years' experience. Fifteen of these years have been at Calendar Hospital; first as a therapist, then as an assistant chief, and finally for the past nine years as department head. He has always been a dedicated, competent, and effective employee. Managerially speaking, he is considerably more authoritative than Mary, and his closer supervision has led to an unpar­alleled patient incident and employee safety record. Very rarely is there a problem in either of these two areas. He insists that his staff deliver the best care and treatment to patients, and he tolerates no nonsense or "goofing off' from any of his subordinates. He is 100 percent honest and forthright with his people and lets them "know where they stand" at all times. His frankness, however is frequently misinterpreted as insensitivity and has led to a departmental turnover rate'(either by transfer or resignation) that is 8 percent higher than that of any other area of the hospital. The employees who remain in his unit proudly attest to the fact that "when we do things, we do them right."

Questions:

1. Which of the two candidates will you recommend and why?

2. What factors weighed most heavily in your decision?

3. How will you notify Tom and Mary of your decision?

Meet in groups of five to decide the answers to the above questions.

Date: 2015-12-11; view: 805