Chapter 18- Strategic planning/Goal setting Flashcards
Planning is a process designed to achieve goals in dynamic, competitive environments. What is the first step that you, as a new manager, will undertake to develop a strategic plan of action for a program about congestive heart failure?
a. Search the environment to determine changes that may affect the organization.
b. Appraise the organization’s strengths and weaknesses.
c. Identify the major opportunities for and threats to the organization.
d. Identify and evaluate the various strategies available to the organization.
ANS: A
Assessment of the external environment is the first step in the strategic planning process.
A community-based pain management program is being planned for your region. As a coordinator of a home care agency, you have been requested to develop a conceptual framework, mission statement, philosophy, and objectives for the program. In what order will you pursue this endeavour?
a. Objectives, philosophy, and mission statement.
b. Philosophy, objectives, and mission statement.
c. Philosophy, mission statement, and objectives.
d. Mission statement, philosophy, and objectives
ANS: D
The development of the mission statement is the first step in defining the purpose and direction of the organization after an assessment has been completed.
Northwestern Hospital has decided to implement peer review. As a clinical leader in the emergency department, you have overall responsibility for ensuring that this is in place by next month. The most important step in this process is to:
a. Provide an educational session for staff on peer review.
b. Revise the mission statement, objectives, and performance standards.
c. Develop objectives and performance standards with employees.
d. Implement objectives and performance standards.
ANS: A
Once a strategic plan has been developed, the next step is open communication and execution of the specific plan, which, in this instance, is peer review.
The clinic nurse understands that the advantages of planning include:
a. Assisting staff in critical thinking and improving decisions.
b. Orienting people to react instead of act.
c. Forcing managers to be financially efficient and effective.
d. Focusing on activities, not results.
ANS: A
Effective planning means that everyone in the organization manages his or her own work and sees how it relates to organizational goals. Being proactive means “aggressive planning”, which ensures that decisions are improved and are oriented toward organizational goals.
As a nursing leadership student, you have had the opportunity to develop a palliative care manual that will be used by the palliative care network (PCN) in your region for teaching health care providers. The PCN has requested that you provide a prioritized strategic plan of action for the manual on a province-/territory-wide basis. What is the first priority?
a. Motivate the target market.
b. Research the target market.
c. Communicate benefits to the target group.
d. Package the product.
ANS: B
To put a strategic plan into place, it is necessary to conduct an environmental assessment.
he chief nursing officer has to write a strategic plan. The most difficult stage in the strategic planning process is:
a. Assessment of the external and internal environment.
b. Review of mission statement, goals, and objectives.
c. Identification of strategies.
d. Implementation of strategies.
ANS: A
Determination of strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats requires openness to what is being said and observed and is critical for producing relevant responses in the latter phases of strategic planning.
The reasons that nursing administrators sometimes do not plan in a systematic manner include:
a. Lack of understanding of the planning process.
b. Lack of knowledge regarding the internal and external operations of theorganization.
c. Not enough hours in the day for both day-to-day operations and planning.
d. Delegation of the task to subordinates.
ANS: A
The nurse manager should participate in strategic planning and quality initiatives within the organization. Lack of knowledge is a common reason for nonparticipation in planning initiatives. Knowledge regarding philosophy, goals, and external and internal operations of the organization is necessary, and a good understanding of the planning process is paramount for systematic planning.
From your observation of planning activities in the organization, you have noticed that planning and decision making occur at various levels of the organization. The nurse manager has overall responsibility for which of the following?
a. Sending out postcards.
b. Organizing a telephone follow-up.
c. Monitoring ongoing activities and projects.
d. Listing the patient population.
ANS: C
The nurse manager should articulate organizational decision making for the criteria model adopted by the organization and monitor ongoing implementation of the plan.
Which of the following represents a well-written objective?
a. “To reduce hospital-acquired infections and to implement procedures to reduce
infections.”
b. “To increase staff satisfaction and to decrease burnout.”
c. “To increase the health of the community.”
d. “To implement evidence-informed practice on nursing units, according to adoption
of evidence-informed processes, by June 1, 2016.”
ANS: D
Effective objectives are known as SMART objectives. The acronym SMART refers to key attributes of effective objectives: specific, measurable, agreed on (or some use the word achievable), realistic, and time bound.
To conduct assessment of the internal environment, the strategic planning team for Pacific Hospital:
a. Invites community members and staff of the hospital to an evening focus group session.
b. Discusses what it sees as the primary threats and opportunities in demographic shifts affecting the hospital.
c. Invites all levels of staff to focus groups on the effectiveness of the hospital
environment, including information systems and staffing.
d. Asks the board to provide a summary of major opportunities for the future.
ANS: C
Assessment of the internal environment should include all levels of staff and facilitates feedback on effectiveness of strengths and weaknesses of systems and processes within the institution.
- In assessing the internal environment, the strategic planning team at Pacific Hospital discovers that 90% of staff members have no idea what the current mission statement means. This is probably related to:
a. The level of abstraction inherent in mission statements.
b. Development of the statement by the administration team with no other staff involvement.
c. Outdated goals and objectives contained in the mission statement.
d. Failure to provide action statements within the mission statement.
B
Pacific Hospital’s strategic planning team develops a process to include staff in development of the mission statement. Which of the following statements would indicate that staff members have been able to develop an effective mission statement?
a. “Pacific Hospital will increase its sustainability by increasing revenue streams
within the next 3 years. Revenue streams are important to our hospital and are a driving force in our sustainability in the face of insurer and government funding changes.”
b. “Pacific Hospital has a desire to relate to its community to enable appropriate identification of programming needs by July 2016.”
c. “Pacific Hospital will provide family-centred care to the community of Pacific Rim. It is committed to delivering a full spectrum of services that foster collaborative partnerships among clients, families, and the hospital, and it utilizes evidence-informed practice to guide planning and interventions.”
d. To provide health promotion programs for school-aged children.
ANS: C
An effective mission statement reflects the values and direction of the organization. Included in the statement are beliefs about individuals, health, practitioners, and the relationship of the organization to practice, research, professionalism, and education.
Through its strategic planning processes, the strategic planning team at Pacific Hospital learns that nursing staff members are uncomfortable with using evidence-informed practice, and that they perceive that only limited resources are available to support translation of evidence into their usual practice. Because this issue has been identified, the team determines that a plan of action is required to address the issue. Who should be involved in determining this plan?
a. Nursing unit managers
b. Staff nurses
c. All staff
d. Administration
ANS: A
Departmental managers need to be involved in this phase, which includes development of long-and short-term goals, allocation of resources, and preparation of the budget.
The process of developing, negotiating, and formalizing the targets of an organization is:
a. Objective development.
b. Goal setting.
c. Philosophy creation.
d. Strategic planning.
ANS: B
Goal setting is the process of developing, negotiating, and formalizing the targets or objectives of an organization.
Of the following types of environmental assessments, which is an example of a patient trend assessment?
a. Economic forces and the escalating rates of health care costs.
b. Input about current and future services.
c. The numbers and types of health care providers.
d. Availability of rehabilitative and home health care services.
ANS: B
Although all the choices are examples of an environmental assessment, only prospective users’ input about current and future services is part of the patient trend assessment.
