A future for the corporate planner?

Although not initiated by the event, it seems appropriate that this article is written on the tenth anniversary of the founding of The Society for Long Range Planning. It is entirely coincidental that Ansoff's book ‘Corporate Strategy’, which has evolved into the standard work on corporate planning, also appeared about a decade ago. This fortuitous coincidence has been further emphasized by the recent publication of another book from the same authority which introduces an entirely new factor into the future prospects for corporate planners. An attempt is made here to assess its implications.     

Who will lead?

A recent survey conducted by the UCLA Center for Health Services Management and the Physician Executive Practice of Heidrick & Struggles, an executive search firm, sheds light on the emerging physician executive's role. The goal of the research was to identify success factors as a means of evaluating and developing effective industry leaders. Respondents were asked to look at specific skills in relation to nine categories: Communication, leadership, interpersonal skills, self-motivation/management, organizational knowledge, organizational strategy, administrative skills, and thinking. Communication, leadership, and self-motivation/management emerged, in that order, as the three most important success factors for physician executives. An individual's general competencies, work styles, and ability to lead others through organizational restructuring defines his or her appropriateness for managerial positions in the health care industry.     

What jobs will there be in the future?

Physicians often ask what kinds of jobs there will be for physician executives in the future. Learn what two futurists and four recruiters think about this issue in this excerpt from ACPE's recent book: A Career Guide for Physician Executives.     

Get real: what will draw physicians to the Web?

What are physicians waiting for? What will it take to stimulate widespread adoption of Internet medical systems? How can health care leaders and physicians help the technology innovators and the executives of technology firms understand the components necessary to assure physician acceptance and utilization of new tools? (1) Don't underestimate the personal nature of a physician's practice. It really isn't a "business." (2) Most physicians are not Luddites; they are just extremely pragmatic and practical. (3) For the majority of physicians to adopt a new technology in their private office practice, it must address three major issues: money, hassle, and patient care. There are many obstacles to adopting the new technologies that are the result of physician training and expectations and the current models of payment and revenue generation. Some technological innovations are presented to physicians without sufficient respect for their knowledge of how medical practices really work. The benefits promised often don't match with the needs structure of the physicians. As a consequence, the cycle of diffusion of these new systems is extended and delayed.     

Which way to the frontier? Physician executives talk about the future

The author interviewed trustees, senior managers, and physicians at Moses Cone Health System in Greensboro, North Carolina, Legacy Health System in Portland, Oregon, and Henry Ford Health System in Detroit, Michigan. These three successful health care systems bracket the national market in size, geography, and managed care penetration. The comments of physicians are presented here, drawn from the book, Designing 21st Century Health Care: Leadership in Hospitals and Healthcare Systems. What emerges most clearly from their comments is the enormity of the task ahead. There is wide-spread agreement that substantial improvements in the quality and cost of care are possible, an encouraging stream of anecdotes and ideas about how to proceed, but a lack of consensus on critical components of how to organize practices and promote effective care.     

Can the patient be the focus of managed care?

If the question were simply put: "What is it that succeeds or fails to meet patients' needs in managed care?" Dr. John M Ludden would have a short answer. "It depends. Success depends on whether you are talking about individuals or about populations of patients. And it depends on whether you are talking about meeting patients' needs or their desires. It depends on whether you're talking about well patients or sick patients, young patients or older patients, new patients or established patients, rich patients or poor patients. And it depends on your ability to balance each of these qualities." This article explores how to translate high-quality care for a population to high-quality care for individuals.     

Can you recognize the winds of change?

If you find yourself between a rock and a hard place during your career, there are some tough choices you will have to make. Read how one physician executive made these choices.     

Can Sustainable Development and the Market Co-exist?

This article looks at Shell vision of sustainable development which is based on three essential and inseparable building blocks — the creation and maintenance of economic wealth, environmental improvement and social equity. All three must be integrated and balanced for long-term success, and all three underpin the Shell approach to global markets.The process of moving towards a sustainable future is under way, but the rate of progress depends on customer choice, innovation and investment — in other words, on market forces. If governments set targets and provide a good framework, companies like Shell will take the chances and offer solutions that support sustainable development. Then the markets will decide.Shell companies see support for sustainable development as a key element in continuing business success. This article discusses some of the ways Shell works with a wide range of partners to seek ways of achieving the best balance between economic, environmental and social considerations and between short term and long-term benefits. On this basis, the market supports the aims of sustainable development and Shell companies intend to play their part by providing, responsibly, efficiently and profitably, the energy the world's growing populations will need and want in the 21^st century.     

What is the future of work? A science mapping analysis

This article aims to systematise and provide a structure for research into the Future of Work (FoW). We used SciMAT to conduct a science mapping analysis based on co-word bibliographic networks. The Web of Science (WoS) database was used for article retrieval, and a total of 2,286 documents were identified from 1959 to 2019. Our results are counterintuitive, as concerns over satisfaction, leadership values or corporate social responsibility (CSR) appear alongside traditional human resource management (HRM) themes, such as organisational commitment or careers, as well as more current FoW themes, such as the impact of technological change on employment, wage inequality, vulnerable workers, telework or talent management. In addition, we offer a classification of the most prolific FoW research themes and challenges into technological, social, economic and political categories.     

Leadership selection: Can changing the default break the glass ceiling?

Leadership selection often requires candidates to actively choose to express their interest. Using a series of incentivized experiments with more than 1000 participants, we compare such an Opt-in mechanism with an Opt-out mechanism where everyone qualified for the position is in the candidate pool by default, but individuals can choose to opt out of the selection process. The results reveal a gender gap in participation decisions under the Opt-in mechanism. The gender gap exists even when individuals know they are the top performers, suggesting helping women improve their performance may not necessarily reduce gender gaps. Importantly, women are more likely to participate under the Opt-out mechanism and gender gaps in leadership selection are reduced.     

A future for fishing?

This article outlines the potential in the fishing industry viewed from the present. The author argues that current methods are still relatively inefficient and that increases of 50–100 per cent can be expected in the next 10–20 years. Further that these larger catches can contribute markedly to world protein requirements. The article includes consideration of system fishing and concludes with a picture of the British fishing industry being among the most advanced in the world.     

Who supports physicians in malpractice cases?

Malpractice suits have a devastating emotional impact on physicians. Learn about a unique service offered by the HealthTexas Provider Network to help doctors deal with the shock and sadness.     

Can dealing with emotional exhaustion lead to enhanced happiness? The roles of planning and social support

Drawing upon the sustainable happiness model (Lyubomirsky, Sheldon, & Schkade, 2005), we examine boundary conditions to the detrimental effect of emotional exhaustion on happiness. We posit that perceiving low supervisor support enhances the employee’s engagement in the development of an action plan, which, when paired with an active search for instrumental social support, boosts happiness. Drawing on three distinct samples from participants working in diverse occupations (81 Portugal-based team leaders working under direct supervision; 177 US-based supervised full-time workers and 242 US-based employees working full-time and under direct supervision), we found that perceived supervisor support (PSS) moderated the emotional exhaustion-planning association, whereas searching for instrumental social support moderated the planning-happiness relationship. We also found that the indirect effect of emotional exhaustion on happiness, via planning, was positive and significant only when employees perceived low supervisor support and searched highly for instrumental social support. We conclude that under some conditions, the process of dealing with emotional exhaustion can enhance happiness. Implications for research on happiness, coping and social support are discussed, as well as implications for practice.     

What skills do physician leaders need now and in the future?

The role of the physician leader is moving beyond traditional medical staff issues. A recent national survey of physician leaders shows a growing need for education on specific technical, leadership, and practical skills. The results reveal the medical leadership skills that physician executives consider important today, and provide a window to the future about the skills that will be important tomorrow. Physicians say they need training now in quality assurance, clinical benchmarking, decision-making, and strategic planning. And when they gaze into the future and see the rapid changes throughout health care, they say they'll need more training in communication, organizational change, effective listening, and systems thinking.     

How should managed care physicians be paid?

When paying a physician for medical or surgical services, most patients expect the traditional bill or charge for that encounter or visit. While most people also pay health insurance premiums, few patients expect to prepay for their health care. But that is the foundation of most managed health care systems-prepaid medicine. PPOs, IPAs, and HMOs are typically health care providers linked together to provide services to a set population for a specific prepaid fee or "capitation" payment. Other providers contract with these managed care insurers to receive a predetermined and often "discounted" professional fee for services. These managed care organizations have already gone through a number of stages in determining how physicians are to be compensated for their services, and further changes loom on the horizon.     

Does market share lead to profitability?

For a number of years the findings of the well-known PIMS study have played a predominant role in strategic thinking which holds that the market share of a business enterprise is ‘the key to profitability’. One criticism raised against this proposition consist in showing, through empirical evidence, that the maxim ‘the bigger, the better’ does not always hold, without, however, going into any analysis of the relationships involved and without presenting a total model. As a result, even today it is still not clear when, how, and why market share is in some way related to return on investment. It is intended, in this article, to formulate a general model, which will describe and explain these relationships. This model may be helpful in formulating strategies.