Change and Communication Strategies in Healthcare

📄 Words:	670
📝 Subject:	Administration & Regulation
📑 Pages:	3
✍️ Type:	Essay

Strategy	Would the strategy best facilitate change for the short or long term and why?
Change strategy 1: Discourse	According to Norman, discourse change strategy works best for the completion of short-term targets such as communicating the need for change to employees (2013). At the early stages, this strategy assists in eliminating potential resistance to the proposed change by providing nurses with an opportunity to discuss the planned implementation, its course, and the associated outcomes.
Change strategy 2: Staff Involvement	This strategy allows for a facilitation of a long-term change. Thus, the actively involved staff is likely to assist in proposing alternative solutions at the planning stage, tracking the plan’s flaws at the implementation stage, and providing accurate outcome evaluation at the assessment stage (Kemppainen, Tossavainen, & Turunen, 2012).
Change strategy 3: Unfreezing	Unfreezing change strategy facilitates both short-term and long-term changes. According to Bowers (2011), this strategy is helpful for eliminating the emotional resistance and ensuring consistent psychological adaptation to the new forms of work that the proposed change implies. Hence, the strategy implies that nurses and other involved employees should be properly prepared to accept the change; otherwise, they will continue to follow the familiar operation pattern.
Change strategy 4: Shared Decision-Making	This change strategy ensures the facilitation of a long-term change implementation as it allows for an enhanced staff inclusion. Additionally, shared decision-making essentially implies shared responsibility that makes employees stay focused on the change outcomes (Jaafarpour & Khani, 2011).
Change strategy 5: Staff Development	Staff development change strategy facilitates change for the long term. Hence, occasional training programs might fail to help to implement the change in practice. Staff development, in its turn, focuses on three main dimensions: understanding learners, educating them in an appropriate manner, and providing a favorable environment and support. This complex approach ensures employees’ professional readiness for change and lets them feel more confident in the course of its implementation (Pool, Poell, & Cate, 2013).
Communication strategy 1: Continuing Communication	The strategy facilitates the change from a long-term perspective. According to Nordin (2014), it helps to eliminate employees’ mistrust and doubts concerning the proposed change. As a result, it ensures a smooth transition to the new format of operations and allows for a gradual employee adaptation.
Communication strategy 2: Frequent Communication	Along with continuing communication, frequent communication strategy likewise allows for the facilitation of a long-term change. The strategy provides for enhanced operational integrity and helps to eliminate emerging problems in a timely manner (Nordin, 2014).
Communication strategy 3: Storytelling	This communication strategy facilitates the change for the short term. It is assumed to be rational to implement it at the beginning stage to explain the change to employees through real-life examples. Gill (2011) notes that storytelling helps to communicate the change to stakeholders in the form of an informal conversation.
Communication strategy 4: Tailored Communication	This strategy can facilitate change for the long term by ensuring that the most critical implementation guidelines are individually delivered through print or the Internet. It can be used at any stage of the change process to explain the key details to employees (Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality, 2012).
Communication strategy 5: Segmented Communication	The strategy allows for the facilitation of a long-term change. It helps to communicate the change to all stakeholders group in the most productive manner by shaping the message in accordance with the specificity of the target audience (Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality, 2012).
Discuss 1 transformational strategy you could use to support this change and why you chose this strategy. It is considered that one of the most effective transformational strategies for the proposed change implementation is power-sharing. This strategy allows for productive segregation of duties and enhances the outcome quality. In other words, it ensures that the key change actors have a clear vision of the assigned tasks and the expected results (Jasper & Jumaa, 2016). The consistent split of responsibilities is particularly critical in the context of the proposed change as its implementation will involve specialists from different departments.

Reference List

Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality. (2012). Communication and dissemination strategies to facilitate the use of health-related evidence. Web.

Bowers, B. (2011). Managing change by empowering staff. Nursing Times, 107(1), 32-33.

Gill, D. R. (2011). Using storytelling to maintain employee loyalty during change. International Journal of Business and Social Science, 2(15), 23-32.

Jaafarpour, M., & Khani, A. (2011). Nurses’ roles in health promotion practice: an integrative review. Journal of Clinical and Diagnostic Research, 5(1), 16-19.

Jasper, M., & Jumaa, M. (2016). Effective healthcare leadership. New York, NY: John Wiley & Sons.

Kemppainen, V., Tossavainen, K., & Turunen, H. (2012). Nurses’ roles in health promotion practice: an integrative review. Health Promotion International, 28(4), 1-12.

Nordin, J. (2014). Communicating organizational change: Strategies for communicating change. Web.

Norman, I. (2013). The Art and Science of Mental Health Nursing: Principles and Practice. Berkshire, England: McGraw-Hill Education.

Pool, I., Poell, R., & Cate, O. (2013). Nurses’ and managers’ perceptions of continuing professional development for older and younger nurses: a focus group study. International Journal of Nursing Studies, 50(1), 34-43.

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