Please discuss the key steps in negotiations that are critical to a successful strategic alliance between the community leaders and the Hopkins team.

Please describe what steps Michael should now take to handle the clear anger and conflicts that have been created during the meeting. Make sure your answers are based on your understanding of emotional intelligence, active listening and conflict resolution techniques.

background

The State of Maryland has long struggled with an increasing gap in health care services for many of racial and ethnic minorities, the medically underserved, and rural residents. In response to these statistics, Maryland has made health equity a policy priority and has launched a series of grants and programs designed to reverse health disparities. It has committed $200 million from the Cigarette Restitution Fund with the intention of meeting the following goals:

• Raise awareness of health disparities across Maryland
• Strengthen health equity leadership
• Improve health outcomes for racial and ethnic populations or other at-risk groups
• Build a culturally competent workforce in health
• Support activities using evidence-based practices and outcomes-driven programs

Michael is from Cecil County, Maryland, a rural area with mostly blue-collar workers and farmers. He graduated from Rutgers University with a degree in Public Health. He returned home and secured a job with the Northern Maryland Health Equity Coalition as a Community Coordinator. The Northern MD Coalition is responsible for Hartford, Cecil, Carroll and Frederick Counties. Each coalition is given the freedom to develop its own local programs to address the specific needs of its communities. However, all outcomes must be data-driven and supported by either best practices or include high quality evaluations.

Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health is contracted to provide data analysis, program evaluation and supportive services for the coalitions. It also handles several administrative tasks for the program.

The Executive Director (ED) of the Northern MD Coalition, Maria Sanchez, is a well known public health administrator who worked for the Baltimore City Health Department as a program manager for the HIV Services Program for more than 18 years. Michael was hired to strengthen health equity leadership throughout the region (bullet 2) and build a culturally competent workforce in health with a focus on providers, health systems and public health offices (bullet 4).