Workplace Environment Assessment

How healthy is your workplace Environment?

You may think your current organization operates seamlessly, or you may feel it has many issues. You may experience or even observe things that give you pause. Yet, much as you wouldn’t try to determine the health of a patient through mere observation, you should not attempt to gauge the health of your work environment based on observation and opinion. Often, there are issues you perceive as problems that others do not; similarly, issues may run much deeper than leadership recognizes.

There are many factors and measures that may impact organizational health. Among these is civility. While an organization can institute policies designed to promote such things as civility, how can it be sure these are managed effectively? In this Discussion, you will examine the use of tools in measuring workplace civility.

To Prepare:

• Review the Resources and examine the Clark Healthy Workplace Inventory, found on page 20 of Clark (2015).
• Review and complete the Work Environment Assessment Template in the Resources.
• QUESTION
• Post a brief description of the results of your Work Environment Assessment. Based on the results, how civil is your workplace? Explain why your workplace is or is not civil. Then, describe a situation where you have experienced incivility in the workplace. How was this addressed? Be specific and provide examples.

Study shows that when a work environment is healthy, it brings lots of positive attribute to the job such as job satisfaction, staff retention, and patient safety (Marshall & Broome, 2017).  This week assignment focuses on how healthy is our work environment, according to Marshall & Broome (2017), interprofessional collaboration is necessary to achieve effective leadership in healthcare.  The following core values are essential for interprofessioal collaboration that influence quality patient care: respect, accountability, communication and teamwork (Marshall & Broome, 2017).  In order to address workplace incivility, one must do an organizational assessment.  Cynthia Clark developed Healthy Workplace Inventory to determine the health environment of a workplace.

            My workplace scored a 42 in Clark’s Healthy Workplace Inventory assessment, which states a score less than 50 is very unhealthy.  My workplace is not civil based on the following statements receiving “completely untrue” responses: high level of employee morale and job satisfaction, organization culture is assessed on an on going basis, there is comprehensive mentoring program for all employees, emphasis on employee wellness and self-care, sufficient resources for professional growth and development, workload is reasonable, manageable, and fairly distributed.  My organization has the possibilities of a mentoring program but lack resources to achieve it. 

            A situation I have experienced incivility in the workplace is bullying.  A nurse I oriented in the PICU started to spread rumors about me and it eventually got back to me.  I know conflict resolution is one of my weaknesses so I asked my manager to handle it.  The nurse ended up being spoken to twice by my manager for two different incidents.  After the third incident, I decided to talk to her myself with the charge nurse present in a private room.  After that conversation, she stopped spreading rumors and talking badly about me.

            With the purpose of nurturing a civil and collaborative culture health care professionals must focus on the higher purpose- providing safe, effective, patient care, and skilled communication (Clark, 2015).  Inter-collaboration among leaderships suggests a successful healthy work environment.  “High quality communication combined with high quality interpersonal relationships results in better patient outcome’”(Laureate Education, 2018).

References

Clark, C. M. (2015). Conversations to inspire and promote a more civil workplace. American Nurse Today, 10(11), 18-23. Retrieved from  https://www.americannursetoday.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/11/ant11-CE-Civility-1023.pdf

Laureate Education (Producer). (2018). Diagnosis: Communication Breakdown [Video file]. Baltimore, MD: Author.

Marshall, E. S., & Broome, M. E. (2017). Transformational leadership in nursing: From expert clinician to influential leader (2nd ed.). New York, NY: Springer.

NURS6053 Week 7 Discussion Template

THIS MUST BE A SCHOLARLY PAPER AND ASSESSMENT

THIS DQ IS NOT INTENDED TO BE A VEHICLE FOR VENTING

Week 7 – 9 work must be scholarly and graduate level work. This assignment should not be a vehicle for venting but to describe a real workplace issue, identify an evidence-based solution, and provide constructive strategies for improvement based on theory and evidence in the literature.

By Day 3

Post a brief description of the results of your Work Environment Assessment. Based on the results, how civil is your workplace? Explain why your workplace is or is not civil. Then, describe a situation where you have experienced incivility in the workplace. How was this addressed? Be specific and provide examples.

By Day 6

Respond to at least two of your colleagues on two different days

If you’re using new terminology from the course readings

Define/Describe the terms in your own words (paraphrase) or quote the authors but use the appropriate APA citation!! Then… apply those terms to your situation.

· Define – Describe

· Analyze and Apply

· Support with Appropriate References

Below is the APA scholarly format required for ALL Discussion Questions

1. APA does not allow a Level I heading “Introduction” for your introductory paragraph 

http://blog.apastyle.org/apastyle/2009/07/five-essential-tips-for-apa-style-headings.html

2. Use the Level I headings provided for you below

3. Remove the Criteria # from the Level I headings before you post to the classroom

Do Not Include a Level I Heading for your introduction – APA does not allow us to use “Introduction” as a Level I Heading

The next page is the required template for your Discussion Question

· Please complete your response in this template then copy/paste into the Week 1 Discussion Question link

· This is a self-reflection assignment. MINIMAL use of first person is acceptable.

· Remove the criterion # from each section – they are included for your benefit only

According to (Marquis & Huston, 2017), effective leaders are vital to the success of an organization. Leaders are individuals with a formal title and those without a title, which can be just as effective. Transformational leaders empower and motivate nurses and can cultivate evidence-based, organizational culture change (Stetler, Richie, Rycroft-Malone, & Charns, 2014). However, informal leaders can influence the organizational climate by showing co-workers how to incorporate the change (Downey, Parslow, & Smart, 2011).

Workplace Assessment Summary

According to the American Association of Critical-Care Nurses, to establish and sustain healthy work environments there are six standards skilled communication, true collaboration, effective decision-making, appropriate staffing, meaningful recognition, and authentic leadership. (Clark,2015). These standards help to provide a civil working environment. In the determination of workplace civilization and health of the environment of the workplace, the Clifton Workplace Assessment Tool was utilized.

The organization scores a 58, which determined an unhealthy work environment. The organization lacks communication, team work, compassion for employees, and burn out. If management communicated with their employees, they would see that they are overworked and underappreciated for the time they contribute to the organization.

Evaluation

Each department has one manager that is responsible to the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) the Chief Nursing Officer (CNO) and the Chairman of the Board of Directors. The CEO and the CNO, along with the Board of Director’s approval, make the significant organizational and financial decisions. According to Marquis and Huston (2017), in a flat design, there is an attempt at decentralizing the organization. However, our significant decisions appear to come down from upper management.

Each department leader has control of hiring, firing, and most functional decisions (within the budget) in our organization, which is an example of decentralized decision making (Marquis & Huston, 2017). For civility to thrive in any workplace, leaders at all levels must hold themselves accountable for demonstrating organizational values and making sure their staff does too. The organization’s leaders generally exhibit and discuss values but also make it clear that meeting business objectives is always more important than adhering to company values this deems the facility uncivil.

Addressing Incivility

The acuity of the patients has been extremely high over the past year. Nurses and nursing aides are racking up the over-time. Our manager needed an extra nurse and aide on certain days. However, the new position control committee, comprised of the four department managers, the CEO, the CNO, the Chief Financial Officer (CFO) and the Chairman of the board must approve of any positions, declined this request. She was able to show the amount of overtime paid and pleaded for help since most of us were exhausted. Therefore, this made somewhat of an improvement that helped the staff not feel so overwhelmed.

Summary

Poor management and poor planning created a chaotic environment for the staff and our leaders. Mitchell (2013) states change usually fails because management (or the change agent) doesn’t follow a framework for change (Mitchell, 2013). Using a change framework could help improve action plans, communication, teamwork, and leadership. Proactive planning is critical for change to avoid organizational outcome failures (Marquis & Huston, 2017).

References

Clark, C.M. (2015). Conversations to inspire and promote a more civil workplace. American Nurse Today, 10(11), 18-23. Retrieved from https://www.americannursetoday.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/11/ant11-CE-Civility-1023.pdf

Downey, M., Parslow, S., & Smart, M. (2011). The hidden treasure in nursing leadership: informal leaders. Journal of Nursing Management, 19(4), 517-521. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1365-2834.2011.01253.x

Marquis, B. L., & Huston, C. J. (2017). Organizational planning. Leadership roles and management functions in nursing: Theory and application (9th ed. (pp. 160-185). Philadelphia, PA: Lippincott, Williams & Wilkins.

Mitchell, G. (2013). Selecting the best theory to implement planned change. Nursing Management, 20(1), 32-37. Retrieved from https://web-b-ebscohost-com.ezp.waldenulibrary.org/ehost/detail/detail?vid=0&sid=240d1acb-23dc-4689-a606-bb5701c4d2fa%40sessionmgr103&bdata=JnNpdGU9ZWhvc3QtbGl2ZSZzY29wZT1zaXRl#AN=108003510&db=rzh