Sally, a 20-year employee of ABEXYL Medical Center, has served as the Director of Patient Affairs for the last 10 years. She leads a team of 12 employees, most of whom have been hired within the last year. Sally's department, more than any other department with the organization, has experienced frequent turnover since she became the director, but her favorable relationship with the long-time CEO has inspired leaders within the organization to avoid investigating the cause of it and, to instead, merely "look the other way." Earlier this year, the long-time CEO hastily resigned, and a new CEO was appointed. The new CEO has expressed a keen interest in assessing the culture of the organization to ensure that it is one that employees enjoy and thrive in, and in turn, that patients value and appreciate. As the new CEO, one of her first orders of business was to bring in external consultants to survey the employees to gauge their levels of engagement as well as their experiences within the organization and to interview departments with low or unsatisfactory results. Sally's department, Patient Affairs, was among the list of areas with employees to be interviewed. All survey results and interview feedback were confidential. During their one-on-one interviews with the external consultants, Sally's employees took turns sharing their responses to questions asked about their experiences. Several of her employees shared how they enjoy their individual jobs but expressed that they didn't particularly enjoy the culture nor the leadership in their department. A common theme was that many of them found their leader to be difficult and untrustworthy. A couple of employees went on to share the disconnect that they perceive between the organization's credo and culture compared to what they experience within the department. Other employees provided examples of times when their director (Sally) would ask for the team's input and affirm to them that she would support their ideas and suggestions but that she would later renege on her word and disregard their input. Some employees also shared that they have requested time off in accordance with the department's Advanced Notice for Time Off Policy only to be denied while their director's "favorite few" were approved for time off requests that were made only one to two days before the days that they requested to be off. Another common sentiment among most of the team was that Sally was often slow to respond to time-sensitive inquiries and failed to communicate important information (i.e., updates, decisions, policy changes, answers to questions posed by the team that she said she would research and follow back up with them on, etc.). The new CEO was displeased with the reported experiences of this team of employees and requested a meeting with Sally. Rather than reflect on the feedback and develop a plan to adjust and improve her leadership style, Sally chose to submit her notice to retire to Human Resources. The new CEO has selected you, someone from outside of the organization, to be hired and replace Sally as the new Director of Patient Affairs. The CEO has shared with you the concerns of the Patient Affairs department as well as her vision for the organization to have a culture that prioritizes and promotes positivity, equity, and transparency and that fosters a supportive and enjoyable employee experience.


Requirement:

Create and submit a action plan for building trust within your new team/department.  Your action plan should include your solutions to building trust within your team as well as S.M.A.R.T. goals, strategies, and the outcomes you expect your action plan to achieve.  (NOTE: S.M.A.R.T. goals are goals that are specific, measurable, achievable, realistic, and timeframe specific. In other words, you will need to provide target timeframes to accomplish each of your stated goals and/or strategies within your action plan.)  The format for your action plan should begin with you clearly and succinctly stating the problem(s) that your action plan will address.  You will also need to state your intent (i.e., to develop trust, to erode and establish trust, to restore violated trust, etc.,).  Include what your responsibilities will be as well as what you will use as your progress indicators.