An employee at a hospital management company files a report with his supervisor on patient injury and death caused by staff errors. There is an investor meeting scheduled for one month following receipt of the report and our manager has been told by her superiors not to release the report until after that meeting. The employee who created the report disagrees with this decision, puts up a fight, and threatens to leak the report directly to the media.

Profile:

• Susan Novrotsky is a Senior Account Executive managing up to 15 accounts per quarter and supervising a team of six people. Susan’s main functions include new account development, client management, and managing the planning processes for hospital restructuring.
• Daniel Yoshi has been working with Woodland Management Services for five years within Susan’s department. His functions include research and analysis of hospital structure, general competency, cost-efficiency, human resource assessment, and liability issues. Daniel’s research reports are used as the basis for the Woodland’s restructuring plan and capital allocation.

Back History:Novrosky and Yoshi have been working at Woodland for over five years. Novrosky is managing a new account for HillshireHospital. The current objectives are to analyze the efficiency of the staff and the organization as a whole and generate a restructuring plan. Yoshi was directed to research these issues and generate a status report.

Yoshi sent Novrosky a progress email with his findings, highlighting his concern over the exorbitant number of accidents, injuries and unnecessary deaths that have occurred at the hospital over the past four years. The numbers greatly exceed the national rate of accidental harm to patients. Yoshi strongly believes that immediate action is necessary. [Artifact 1 – Yoshi email]

Novrosky forwards the email to her supervisor, Walsh. Novrosky has never come across such severe findings and is unsure how to proceed. [Artifact 2- Novrosky email]

Walsh responds via email, instructing Novrosky and Yoshi to hold off on sharing the research. HillshireHospital has an investor meeting in exactly one month, and if the meeting goes poorly, which it would should this report circulate, there would be no funding for a restructuring project. Walsh agrees that this is a serious issue, but insists it would be foolish and more detrimental to act on it immediately. [Artifact3- president email]

Novrosky leaves a voicemail with Yoshi relaying Walsh’s instruction –Artifact 4 –Novrosky’s voicemail recording]

Scene Set-up: Yoshi is agitated by the voicemail and barges into Novrosky’s office.

Scene Location:Novrosky’s Office, Woodland Management Services; lunch time

The Meeting - Summary: Daniel Yoshi approaches Susan in her office clearly agitated about the email and voicemails he received indicating that no action will be taken on his research findings until after the investor’s meeting in one month. Susan tries to convince Daniel that no action should be taken at this point because that would prevent further funding that is required to restructure the hospital. Daniel contends that taking action now would save lives. Susan reminds Daniel of what the business goals are and to stay focused on that. Daniel’s conscience will not let him accept Susan’s position and he threatens to go to the media if Woodland Management Services does not notify the public and shareholders of HillshireHospital’s problem. The scenario ends with Daniel’s ultimatum.

Afterthoughts – Summary: Susan believes that Daniel is so emotionally involved with his work that he can’t see the bigger picture and what consequences his actions would really have. She indicates that Daniel needs to feel valued and that his work is important so that he doesn’t go to the media. Although Susan admits she can’t prevent Daniel from going to the media, she let others in the organization know about his intentions. She feels she needs to balance her obligation to Daniel to reach his career goals with the needs of the organization which is to get the funding.

What competing organizational goals are present in this scenario?