Delegation can make (or break) your career

Delegation is not a soft skill. Physician executives who do not delegate well and strategically cannot expect to achieve the top jobs now or in the future. It's not enough to have great communications skills to convey your vision. You won't achieve that vision alone; you must have a great team to bring that vision to fruition. However, you can't delegate your first and most important step--self-assessment. To maximize your strengths and minimize your weaknesses, you'll need a clear view of what makes you tick. Then start thinking about your executive role in these terms: Conceptualize work mandates as projects; choose people who are better than you for your team; and try to work yourself out of a job. By learning to delegate, physician executives can make their own careers (as well as those on their team) richer and more fulfilled.     

Becoming who you are.

It's difficult to predict success based only on educational background and career experience, important as they are. More is needed. And one of the aspects that needs to be evaluated is the degree of self-actualization. Self-actualized individuals have worked out their personal issues well enough that their personal life no longer has to intrude into their professional lives and actions. In a word, they are free people. In career terms, self-actualized people are "company people," but not "yes-people." They are executives who have freed themselves to be able to internalize the growth, development, and strategic planning of their organization--because they are able to rise above personal considerations, to shed emotionalism, and see more clearly. Some methods you can use to figure out where you stack up are: Conduct a self-evaluation; identify role models; do what is called "a 360 evaluation."     

Getting a firm grip on the realities for physician executives

Today, physician executives can be found in every health care setting-group practices, hospitals and academic medical centers, insurance companies, drug companies, airlines, the government, and more. But before physicians land these positions, they must negotiate the often difficult passage from clinician to manager to executive to business-minded leader. To manage this transition successfully, physicians must be aware of and understand some basic realities of management positions. The nature of these realities and how physicians interested in management can deal with them are the subject of this article.     

Joint-ventures as strategic choice--a literature review

The concept of 'strategic options' has become firmly established in recent years--this regards choices such as 'organic growth', acquisition, merger, and so on. This paper explores one such route forward, the option of joint-ventures. The examination is undertaken within a framework that considers market structures and the pressures for change. Initial sections introduce a form of analysis based upon the work of Michael Porter. This is used to suggest how and why joint-ventures and other alliances are attractive. Later discussion considers some of the practical considerations when setting-up a joint-venture.     

A dynamic social-ecological model of generational identity in the workplace

We approach generational identity in the workplace as a social identity simultaneously linked to biological and historical location. We outline a dynamic social-ecological model of generational identity in which various levels of influences shape the potential for and manifestation of generational identities in the workplace. We propose that individual generational identity in the workplace is influenced by the interaction of four levels of factors: the workgroup, where generational identity is triggered; the organization, which structures the context in which work-related generational identity takes shape; the extra-organizational environment, which sets the general parameters for generational interactions with occupational and stakeholder groups; and society, where generational phenomena are manifested as historical social movements and depicted as mass media narratives. We examine each of these levels of influence and offer propositions, guided by social identity, self-categorization theory, fault line theory, and generational theory, to elucidate what each level of influence contributes to a fulsome understanding of generation as a complex phenomenon. This approach to generational identity in the workplace highlights the influences that serve as pre-conditions for generational conflict in organizations.     

Observations of Adolescent Peer Group Interactions as a Function of Within‐ and Between‐Group Centrality Status

Observations of adolescent (n = 258; M age = 15.45) peer group triads (n = 86) were analyzed to identify conversation and interaction styles as a function of within‐group and between‐group centrality status. Group members' discussions about hypothetical dilemmas were coded for agreements, disagreements, commands, and opinions. Interactions during a hypothetical decision were rated for openness, dominance, aggression, and prosocial behavior. Hierarchical linear modeling revealed that higher within‐group status predicted more disagreements, commands, and less openness than lower within‐group status. Interactions showed that prosocial and aggressive behavior varied as a function of individual status in low‐status but not high‐status groups. Boys, but not girls, engaged in more openness in higher status groups. Results provide insights into peer socialization.