Directional Strategies Report Essay

St Vincent’s Medical Center is a catholic-based healthcare facility founded in 1905 in Bridgeport, Connecticut. The hospital is under Hartford Healthcare management and wishes to improve its strategic management. The facility has guiding vision, mission, and values statements. The hospital has been affected by health and local, state, and federal laws and policies. The facility has constantly been changing to meet these changes and updating its mission, vision, and mission statements. This directional strategy report looks at St. Vincent’s Medical Center’s impacts on the community around them, how well the mission and vision represent the company, and how they align with the strategic goals.

Effectiveness of the Organizational Directional Strategies

The mission statement explains the reason for the existence of the hospital. The facility’s mission is “Making God’s healing presence known worldwide by improving patients’ health, especially the vulnerable, and advancing social justice.” The mission statement is an overview introduction and explanation of the institution’s existence (Haski-Leventhal, 2020). The organization is founded on the Christian faith and lets the community know so through its mission and services. The catholic church founded the hospital, hence the inclination to issues of religion. However, the mission is straightforward and does not confine the facility to serving Christians only. It includes humanity in its mission, meaning it serves all humans, regardless of religion, race, or any other affiliation. The mission thus guides the facility to serve the diverse community by ensuring all individuals in the community get the services.

The values statement outlines what’s important to the company, its priorities, and how it conducts its activities (Yokomizo, 2020). The institution’s values are “Centerpiece for managing and monitoring performance, Compassion, Inclusion, Integrity, Collaboration, Excellence.” The facility’s staff understands these values clearly. The institution has values reflected in the institution’s partnerships. The organization has a strategic plan to improve care delivery and foster relationships with the community and other stakeholders. The institution also has strong partnerships with facilities, reflecting collaboration, such as the New York College, which helps it achieve its goals and objectives.

The vision statement of the facility is “A healthier future for all, inspired by faith, powered by humanity, and driven by innovation.” The vision statement guides strategic planning by discussing the overall goals of what all care providers should work towards (Yokomizo, 2020). The vision statement leads the facility to develop interventions such as community outreach, homecare programs, and accessible healthcare for particularly vulnerable groups. The facility also incorporates technology in its activities, as seen in the advanced technology and the strategic goal to improve it further. However, the vision is ambiguous and needs improvement. It is challenging to measure its achievement.

Gaps Between Effective Directional Strategies and Existing Organizational Strategies

Any organization must have a vision, mission, and values statements that guide actions and explain the organization’s existence. According to Hypes et al. (2020), a mission statement should be brief and memorable to enhance its retention among staff. It outlines the “who, what, and why” of the institution and guides the organization’s operation. The mission statement, “Making God’s healing presence known worldwide by improving patients’ health, especially the vulnerable, and advancing social justice,” has all these characteristics. On the other hand, the values statement does not support this mission, and Hypes et al. (2020) note that the mission, vision, and values statement should be interdependent and complement each other. Revision of both the mission and vision statements is thus vital.

The vision statement outlines the organization’s desired future: what it hopes to achieve. Haski-Leventhal (2020) states that a vision should be made of facts, not opinions, and it should be motivating, ambitious, and fitted with accurate and reliable indicators. Fuertes et al. (2021) note that the vision statement motivates employees because it gives them a reason and direction to work. St Vincent’s vision statement is not an action plan, is not motivating, and is ambiguous. It outlines that the institution aims to achieve a healthier future but does not outline its plans.

St. Vincent Medical Center has excellently developed functional directional strategies that guide activities in the healthcare facility. Overall, the mission statement reflects the organizational identity and is suitable for the organization but could use some adjustment. The value statement is also vital in promoting the organizational strategic plan. The values such as innovation are reflected in the leadership’s persistent desire to improve the organization and promote better patient outcomes. The organization is also committed to enhancing care providers’ satisfaction.

Alignment Between Organizational Directional Strategies and its Strategic Plan

Fuertes et al. (2021) note that strategic plans are discrete, directional, and differentiated and should support an institution’s mission, vision, and values. Any discrepancy causes stagnation and organizational failure. The organization has four strategic goals: changing organizational technology, improving patient satisfaction scores, changing organizational leadership, and improving community engagement. The organizational values wholly support these goals. Engaging the community will be supported by the collaboration and integration of the values statement. The organizational values of innovation will support the technology implementation. However, the value of managing and monitoring performance needs to be better represented in the vision and strategic plan and may need to be adequately supported in the strategic plan.

The vision needs to be more objective and reliable and entails a statement not backed by the specific actions of achieving the fact. For example, the organization aims to ensure the strategic plan is well supported by the mission as they focus on improving patient outcomes, satisfaction, and quality of services delivered. The second organizational strategy, “to improve patient satisfaction scores and build on the existing organization’s reputation through improved service delivery and care quality evaluation,” is the most relevant and achievable strategy based on the existing organizational directional strategy. An update on the vision statement will help achieve the rest of the organizational strategies by focusing efforts to favor the strategic plan.

Proposed changes to the organizational structure and strategic goals

The vision statement should be measurable, articulable, and achievable based on the organization’s strategic plans. It is often a verb followed by a future position statement. Thus, the statement should be objective and measurable, hence the need for time inclusion in the vision statement (Fuertes et al., 2020). The vision has guided the facility in integrating all services, but there is a need for improvement to create a unidirectional. The organization should be able to measure its performance over time to affiliate time to the values statement. Turnbull et al. (2020) note that timing and objectivity are integrity to strategic planning and organizational success. The vision is not measurable and is mainly ambiguous, hence the need for improvement. The mission statement should also be adjusted to feature the local community because none of its activities or strategic plan has global inclusion. The step will also ensure a change in the direction of efforts. Moreso, the institution should change its population focus from community to county or state. Any healthcare facility serves the local community but also serves patients from other facilities. Efforts in community engagement, such as medical camps and marketing, should also target the county and the state.

Conclusion

St. Vincent Medical Center has developed directional strategies and supporting strategic plans to guide healthcare activities. The changes discussed above on the mission and vision statements will help them with the strategic plan, enhance organizational success, and match the organizational environment. The vision, mission, and values are interconnected, and leaders can leverage their power to influence all organizational activities to ensure relevance and leverage favorable environmental factors.

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References

Fuertes, G., Alfaro, M., Vargas, M., Gutierrez, S., Ternero, R., & Sabattin, J. (2020). Conceptual framework for the strategic management: a literature review—descriptive. Journal of Engineering, 2020. https://doi.org/10.1155/2020/6253013

Haski-Leventhal, D. (2020). On Purpose, Impact, Vision, and Mission. In The Purpose-Driven University. Emerald Publishing Limited. https://doi.org/10.1108/978-1-83867-283-620201003

Hypes, S., Harris, R., & Otis, S. (2020). Establishing Shared Purpose: Developing Unit Specific Mission, Vision, and Values in an Academic Library. Library Leadership & Management, 34(2). https://doi.org/10.5860/llm.v34i2.7401

Turnbull, D., Chugh, R., & Luck, J. (2020). Learning Management Systems, An Overview. Encyclopedia of Education and Information Technologies, 1052-1058. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-10576-1_248

Yokomizo, B. (2020). Strategic Vision and Mission Statements: Exploring Qualitative Perspectives in Health and Human Services (Doctoral dissertation, California Baptist University). http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.12087/79

 

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Assessment 3 Instructions: Directional Strategies Report

Write a directional strategies report (4-6 pages) that examines the alignment of a health care organization’s current directional strategies with its strategic goals. Include improvement recommendations that address gaps between where the organization is and where it wants to go.

Note: Each assessment in this course builds upon the work you have completed in previous assessments. Therefore, you must complete the assessments in the order in which they are presented.

In your previous assessments, you examined how today’s health care organizations prepare themselves for the present and the future through strategic management. Specifically, you analyzed how a health care organization’s external and internal environments affect its operations. You also performed a TOWS analysis to help a health care organization identify strategic objectives to drive and improve all aspects of the company.

The next step is to consider the directional pathways health care organizations take to achieve their strategic objectives. Creating a strategic vision for a health care organization involves developing or revising the organization’s mission, vision, and value statements. Here is a summary of these three directional strategies:

A mission statement captures the organization’s distinctive purpose or reason for being.

A vision statement creates a mental picture of what leaders want the organization to achieve when accomplishing its purpose or mission.

Value statements clarify how the organization will conduct its activities to achieve its mission and vision. They frequently reflect common morality and emphasize respect, integrity, trust, caring, and the pursuit of excellence.

In a first-in-class health care organization, these three directional strategies align with the company’s overarching goals. Once strategic leaders are confident the mission, vision, and values are well formulated, understood, and communicated, they then focus on the activities that will make the most progress toward accomplishing the organization’s mission and move it toward realizing its vision. These activities are called strategic goals.

This assessment provides an opportunity for you to create a directional strategies report. In this report, you will analyze the alignment of your health care organization’s current directional strategies (mission, vision, and value statements) with its strategic goals. You will make recommendations for improvement if you identify gaps between where your health care organization is and where it wants to go.

By successfully completing this assessment, you will demonstrate your proficiency in the following course competencies and assessment criteria:

Competency 1: Analyze organizational structure, design, culture, and climate in relation to environmental forces.

Analyze the effectiveness of a health care organization’s directional strategies.

Identify gaps between effective directional strategies and an organization’s existing directional strategies.

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Competency 3: Recommend an organizational structure and design to optimize a strategic plan.

Analyze the alignment between a health care organization’s directional strategies and its strategic goals.

Propose changes to the organization’s directional strategies that improve alignment between the organization’s structure and strategic goals.

Competency 4: Communicate in a manner that is scholarly professional, and consistent with expectations for professionals in health care administration.

Write a clear, concise, well-organized, and professional directional strategies report that includes conclusions that are supported by relevant evidence.

Follow APA formatting and style guidelines for citations and references.

 

Note: Complete the assessments in this course in the order in which they are presented.

Preparation

Use Mission, Vision, and Values Analysis Questions [DOCX] to complete the assessment. The document identifies three questions about each directional strategy you need to consider as you are analyzing your organization’s fit with its directional strategy.

To prepare for the assessment, reexamine your TOWS matrix from Assessment 2, the analysis of your matrix, and the initial strategies you prepared as part of your draft strategic plan. Once you have reexamined your work, you will be ready to begin work on this assessment.

In addition, you may wish to review the assessment instructions and scoring guide to ensure that you understand the work you will be asked to complete.

Note: As you revise your writing, check out the resources listed on the Writing Center’s Writing Support page.

Scenario

Your manager is pleased with the thorough and impressive work you have done to date. However, she notes that the TOWS matrix findings do not align with the organization’s directional strategies. The organization’s structure needs to align more closely with its strategic goals, so that the organization can be more efficient, competitive, and profitable. She asks for your help once again.

Her next task for you is to examine the organization’s current mission, vision, and value statements, and compare them to the TOWS matrix. She requests that you recommend revisions to the organization’s mission, vision, and value statements so that they more closely align with the organization’s strategic priorities.

Knowing your manager, you understand that she wants your directional strategies report to be insightful, substantive, and brief—all at the same time. You also know that your manager is a visual person. It will serve you well to include appropriate images and diagrams, such as your TOWS matrix, in your report to highlight key information.

 

Requirements

Write a directional strategies report that examines the alignment of a health care organization’s current directional strategies with its strategic goals.

Report Requirements

The requirements, outlined below, correspond to the grading criteria in the Directional Strategies Report Scoring Guide, so be sure to address each point. Read the performance-level descriptions for each criterion to see how your work will be assessed.

Analyze the effectiveness of the organization’s directional strategies.

Use the linked document Mission, Vision, and Values Analysis Questions [DOCX] to determine how effectively the existing directional strategies currently fulfill the requirements of effective directional strategies.

Identify gaps between effective directional strategies and the organization’s existing directional strategies.  Analyze the alignment between the organization’s directional strategies and its strategic goals.

Examine the strategic fit.

How well does the directional strategy fit the environment?

How appropriate is the organization’s direction, given the environmental analysis you completed in Assessment 1?

Which strategic goals make the most sense at this time? Growth? Maintaining the status quo?

Or does contraction make the most sense right now?

Propose changes to the organization’s directional strategies that improve alignment between the organization’s structure and its strategic goals.

Recommend changes you think the organization needs to make to establish a foundation necessary for the organization’s current structure and strategies.

Be sure to support your recommendations with references to current, scholarly, and authoritative sources.

Write a clear, concise, well-organized, and professional directional strategies report that includes conclusions that are supported by relevant evidence.

Follow APA formatting and style guidelines for citations and references.

 

Additional Requirements

Formatting: Prepare your report using a familiar and appropriate document format used by health care organizations, such as a business report or a white paper.

Length: 4–6 pages in length (double-spaced).

 

Proofread your document before you submit it to minimize errors that could distract readers and make it more difficult for them to focus on the substance of your report.

Supporting Evidence

Health care is an evidence-based field. Consequently, readers of your report will want to know the sources of your information, so be sure to include applicable, APA-formatted source citations and references.

Portfolio Prompt: You may choose to save your directional strategies report to your ePortfolio.