Module 1 Overview The purpose, function, and application of strategic planning in health care administration is studied.  Content includes strategic planning, situational analysis, strategy formulation, action planning, and metrics. Leader qualities are used in this module to effectively identify strategic issues, develop a team, and develop a plan of action for overall improvement. Organizational behavior is examined to view its impact on organization vision/mission, organizational goals, organizational communication, and the diverse environment of professionals in health care organizations. Strategic planning models can offer a range of opportunities to an organization. The National Criminal Justice Association (2017) recommends the following strategic planning models: Model One: The Basics Organizations that are small, busy, and have not done much strategic planning before might want to start with this approach. Top-level management often carries out planning in this model rather than using a community-based approach. Basic strategic planning includes: 1. Create a mission statement. A mission statement describes why the organization exists (i.e., identifies its basic purpose). The statement should address both the types of communities or audience that the organization serves, and the services and products it will provide. The top-level management will generally develop the mission statement. The statement will change somewhat over the years. 2. Select the organization’s intermediate goals. Goals are general statements about what needs to be accomplished to meet the purpose or mission and address major issues. 3. Identify approaches or strategies to reach each goal. Strategies are often what change most as the organization eventually conducts more robust strategic planning, particularly as external and internal environments are examined more closely. 4. Identify action plans to implement each strategy. Action plans list the steps that each major function (for example, a department or agency) must take to ensure that it is effectively implementing a strategy. Objectives should be clear enough to be assessed if they have been met. Ideally, top management will develop committees, each with their own work or set of objectives. 5. Monitor and update the plan. Planners regularly monitor progress towards goals and whether action plans are being implemented. Perhaps the most important indicator of success is positive feedback from customers. 6. Note that organizations may want to extend step 3 by identifying additional goals that help develop central operations or administration (e.g., implementing a new goal that strengthens financial management). Model Two: Issue- or Goal-Based Strategic Planning Organizations that begin with basic planning often evolve toward this more comprehensive and effective approach. This model will be the focus of recommendations for use as the preferred process in community-based planning. 1. Identify SWOT (Strengths, W ...

1. Module 1 Overview
The purpose, function, and application of strategic planning in
health care administration is studied. Content includes strategic
planning, situational analysis, strategy formulation, action
planning, and metrics. Leader qualities are used in this module
to effectively identify strategic issues, develop a team, and
develop a plan of action for overall improvement.
Organizational behavior is examined to view its impact on
organization vision/mission, organizational goals,
organizational communication, and the diverse environment of
professionals in health care organizations.
Strategic planning models can offer a range of opportunities to
an organization. The National Criminal Justice Association
(2017) recommends the following strategic planning models:
Model One: The Basics
Organizations that are small, busy, and have not done much
strategic planning before might want to start with this approach.
Top-level management often carries out planning in this model
rather than using a community-based approach. Basic strategic
planning includes:
1. Create a mission statement. A mission statement describes
why the organization exists (i.e., identifies its basic purpose).
The statement should address both the types of communities or
audience that the organization serves, and the services and
products it will provide. The top-level management will
generally develop the mission statement. The statement will
change somewhat over the years.
2. Select the organization’s intermediate goals. Goals are
general statements about what needs to be accomplished to meet
the purpose or mission and address major issues.
3. Identify approaches or strategies to reach each goal.
Strategies are often what change most as the organization
eventually conducts more robust strategic planning, particularly

2. as external and internal environments are examined more
closely.
4. Identify action plans to implement each strategy. Action
plans list the steps that each major function (for example, a
department or agency) must take to ensure that it is effectively
implementing a strategy. Objectives should be clear enough to
be assessed if they have been met. Ideally, top management will
develop committees, each with their own work or set of
objectives.
5. Monitor and update the plan. Planners regularly monitor
progress towards goals and whether action plans are being
implemented. Perhaps the most important indicator of success is
positive feedback from customers.
6. Note that organizations may want to extend step 3 by
identifying additional goals that help develop central operations
or administration (e.g., implementing a new goal that
strengthens financial management).
Model Two: Issue- or Goal-Based Strategic Planning
Organizations that begin with basic planning often evolve
toward this more comprehensive and effective approach. This
model will be the focus of recommendations for use as the
preferred process in community-based planning.
1. Identify SWOT (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and
Threats). SWOT can exist both within and outside an
organization.
2. Identify and prioritize major problems and goals. Go through
the SWOT list and identify the organization’s goals and the
problems that might prevent goals from being reached.
3. Design major strategies (or programs) to address problems
and goals.
4. Design or update the organization’s mission statement (some
organizations may do this step first).
5. Establish action plans (i.e., objectives, resource needs, roles,
and responsibilities for implementation).
6. Create a strategic plan. A strategic plan contains all the
documentation assembled so far. It also provides a record of

3. problems, goals, strategies, updated mission statement, action
plans, and any identified SWOT.
7. Develop a yearly operating plan. Decide which milestones the
organization must reach by the end of each operating year.
8. Develop and authorize budget for the first year.
9. Conduct first-year operations.
10. Monitor/review/evaluate/update Strategic Plan.
Model Three: Alignment Model Strategic Planning
Because this model ensures strong alignment between an
organization’s mission and resources, it is useful for fine-tuning
strategies or finding out why they are not working. An
organization might also choose alignment planning if it is
working to overcome a number of problems around internal
efficiencies. Steps include:
1. Outline the organization’s mission, programs, resources, and
needed support.
2. Identify what is working well and what needs adjustment.
3. Identify how these adjustments should be made.
4. Include the adjustments as strategies in the strategic plan.
Model Four: Scenarios
This approach might be used in conjunction with other models
to ensure planners undertake strategic thinking. Scenarios can
be particularly useful in identifying strategic issues and goals.
1. Identify vulnerabilities. Select several external forces and
imagine related changes that might influence the organization,
such as a change in regulations or a change in demographics,
for example. Scanning the newspaper for headlines often
suggests potential changes that might affect the organization.
2. Imagine scenarios. For each change identified, discuss three
different scenarios (including best, worst, and OK/reasonable
cases) that might result. Worst-case scenarios often inspire
participants to make significant changes in an organization.
3. Design responses. Suggest what the organization might do, or
potential strategies, in each of the three scenarios to respond to
each change.
4. Select common strategies. Planners soon detect common

4. considerations or strategies that must be addressed to respond to
possible external changes.
5. List the most likely problems. Select the most likely external
changes to affect the organization over the next 3 to 5 years,
and identify the most reasonable strategic responses available to
the organization.
Model Five: Organic (or Self-Organizing) Strategic Planning
Strategic planning is sometimes considered mechanistic or
linear; it is understood as general-to-specific or cause-and-
effect in nature. For example, planners first conduct a broad
assessment of the external and internal environments of their
organization; conduct a strategic analysis (SWOT); narrow
down, identify, and prioritize problems; and then develop
specific problem-solving strategies.
Planning can also be compared to the development of an
organism (i.e., a plan can grow in an organic, self-organizing
way). Certain cultures, for instance, Native Americans, might
prefer this unfolding and naturalistic understanding to
traditional, mechanistic methods. Self-organized planning
requires continual reference to common values, dialoguing
around these values, and continual, shared reflection around the
system’s current status. General steps include:
1. Clarify and articulate the organization’s cultural values. Use
dialogue and storyboarding techniques.
2. Articulate the group’s vision for the organization. Use
dialogue and storyboarding.
3. Dialogue regularly. On an ongoing basis (e.g., once every
quarter, discuss the processes needed to arrive at the vision and
what the group is going to do next).
4. Remind everyone regularly that values are not goals. This
type of naturalistic, values-centered planning is never really
“over with”; rather, the group needs to conduct its own values
clarification, dialogue and reflection, and process updates.
5. Be very, very patient. Group decision making—often by
consensus—takes time, and results can emerge irregularly and
without warning.

5. 6. Focus on learning and less on method. Organic planning
encourages spontaneous, unexpected results. In many ways, it
resembles an experiment more than a machine.
7. Translate accomplishments into goals. Ask the group how it
will portray its strategic plans to stakeholders and others who
expect mechanistic, linear results. Be particularly aware of
contract requirements for specific, measurable outcomes.
Model Six: Appreciative Inquiry
Appreciative inquiry (AI) is a breakthrough in organizational
development, training, planning, and problem solving,
generally. AI is based on the assertion that problems are often
the result of personal perspectives and perceptions of
phenomena. For instance, if a certain priority is viewed as a
problem, then the ability to effectively address the priority and
continue to develop in our lives and work can be constrained.
The approach has revolutionized many practices, including
strategic planning and organization development. AI is
implemented through a continuous four-step process.
1. Discovery Phase. The core task in this phase is to appreciate
the best of "what is" by focusing on peak moments of
community excellence—when people experienced the
community at its most alive and effective. Participants then
seek to understand the unique conditions that made the high
points possible, such as leadership, relationships, technologies,
values, capacity building, or external relationships. They
deliberately choose not to analyze deficits, but rather
systematically seek to isolate and learn from even the smallest
victories. In the discovery phase, people share stories of
exceptional accomplishments, discuss the core life-giving
conditions of their community and deliberate upon the aspects
of their history that they most value and want to enhance in the
future.
2. Dream Phase. In the dream phase, people challenge the status
quo by envisioning more valued and vital futures. This phase is
both practical, in that it is grounded in the community's history,
and generative, in that it seeks to expand the community's

6. potential. AI is different from other planning methods because
its images of the future emerge from grounded examples of the
positive past. They are compelling possibilities precisely
because they are based on extraordinary moments from a
community's history. Participants think great thoughts and
create great possibilities for their community, then turn those
thoughts into provocative propositions for themselves.
3. Design Phase. Participants create a strategy to carry out their
provocative propositions. They do so by building a social
architecture for their community that might, for example,
redefine approaches to leadership, governance, participation, or
capacity building. As they compose strategies to achieve their
propositions, local people incorporate the qualities of
community life that they want to protect and the relationships
they want to achieve.
4. Destiny Phase. The final phase involves the delivery of new
images of the future and is sustained by nurturing a collective
sense of destiny. It is a time of continuous learning, adjustment,
and improvisation in the service of shared community ideals.
The momentum and potential for innovation is high by this
stage of the process. Because they share positive images of the
future, everyone in a community realigns their work and co-
creates the future.
Reference:
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agenda for business. Sloan Management Review, 45(4), pp. 56-
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Betancourt, J. R., Green, A. R., Carrillo, J. E., & Ananeh-
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10.1016/S0033-3549(04)50253-4
Brugha, R., & Varvasovszky, Z. (2000). Stakeholder analysis: a
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Free Management E-Books. (2013). SWOT analysis. Retrieved

7. from http://www.free-management-ebooks.com/dldebk-pdf/fme-
swot-analysis.pdf
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10.1002/hpm.1032
Mod 1 SLP 1

8. Assignment
This assignment will build off your SWOT analysis. As the
Organizational Development Manager (ODM) for the
organization that you completed your SWOT Analysis for, you
act as a liaison and advisor to the organization’s leadership, and
begin initiatives within the organization. You have been given
the responsibility to create a team (including yourself and five
other members) to address a set of strategic issues that this
organization is facing, found within your SWOT Analysis.
Choose your team members based on the need of your SWOT
Analysis. For instance, if you reported a weakness as “long
wait-time in the ER,” it might be ideal to include an ER Nurse
Manager on your team. Propose and evaluate a set of strategies
for the organization. You should include at least 1 goal, 2-3
measurable objectives to support the attainment of those goals,
and 2-3 action items to complete the objectives. The goal(s) are
broader, the objectives have a number tied to them to assess,
and action steps have deliverables. You will be presenting a
PowerPoint (PPT) to the Board of Directors at your
organization.
SLP Assignment Expectations
1. You are to create a PPT with at least 8 slides, NOT including
the title or reference slides, that includes the following:
a. Introduction that explains the purpose of the meeting and/or
SWOT analysis.
b. Titles of team members (i.e., ER Nurse Manager, In-Take
Operations Manager, etc.) and a short explanation for each
member's importance on the team.
c. One overarching goal. This goal should address most of the
issues on your SWOT analysis, thus it can be broad.
d. Two or three measurable objectives to support the attainment
of the goal.
e. Two or three items explaining your team's plan of action.
f. Conclusion that summarizes the information included in the
PPT, and an explanation that solidifies how your team will
execute the goal presented and resolve the strategic issues.

9. 2. Your slides should contain bullet points only. Most of your
explanation should be provided in the speaker’s notes.
3. Support your SLP with peer-reviewed articles and at least 2
references. One of the sources can be from your course
readings. Use the following link for additional information on
how to recognize peer-reviewed
journals: http://www.angelo.edu/services/library/handouts/peerr
ev.php.
4. You may use the following source to assist in formatting your
assignment: https://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/resource/560/01
/