Patricia J. Parsons - Beyond Persuasion: Communication Strategies for Healthcare Managers in the Digital Age

BEYOND PERSUASION

Communication Strategies for Healthcare Managers in the Digital Age

Second Edition

The advent of social media has forever changed how organizations communicate with the public, and healthcare organizations are no exception. Beyond Persuasion provides healthcare managers with a guide to using strategic communication to meet both personal and professional objectives in the digital age.

Whether healthcare managers are conducting meetings with employees, answering massive amounts of email, or keeping up with Twitter feeds, their success ultimately depends on their strategic communication skills. The first book to offer a strategic approach to managerial communication in health care, Beyond Persuasion is full of valuable information on issues such as how to develop fundamental skills, communicate strategically with internal groups such as employees and medical staff, and develop relationships with the external community and both traditional and new media.

In this new edition, Patricia J. Parsons has added new references and resources and has updated the text with fresh material on how to weave social media tools, tactics, strategies, and policies into the fundamental discussion about communication as a personal, professional, and organizational priority.

PATRICIA J. PARSONS is Professor of Communication Studies at Mount Saint Vincent University in Halifax.

Communication Strategies for Healthcare Managers in the Digital Age

Second Edition

PATRICIA J. PARSONS

Patricia J. Parsons 2013

Toronto Buffalo London

www.utppublishing.com

Printed in Canada

ISBN 978-1-4426-4721-3 (cloth)

ISBN 978-1-4426-1534-2 (paper)

Printed on acid-free, 100% post-consumer recycled paper with vegetable-based inks.

Publication cataloguing information is available from Library and Archives Canada

University of Toronto Press acknowledges the financial assistance to its publishing program of the Canada Council for the Arts and the Ontario

University of Toronto Press acknowledges the financial support of the Government of Canada through the Canada Book Fund for its publishing activities.

There are four ways, and only four ways, in which we have contact with the world. We are evaluated and classified by these four contacts: what we do, how we look, what we say, and how we say it.

Dale Carnegie

When I first began thinking about how to teach about strategic communication for healthcare managers, it occurred to me that much could be learned from a framework that emulated a computer-based, role-playing game.

Many years ago, I watched my young son manoeuvre his way through a maze of obstacles and tasks, strategically figuring out the best way to achieve mastery of the challenges so that he could move to a higher level of performance. As I thumbed through the pages of the strategy guide, I began to see a connection between the strategic achievement of levels in this game of medieval knights and battles, and the everyday strategies, tools, and tactics that are so necessary to healthcare organizations seeking to nurture their relationships with important constituencies.

I was intrigued by this comparison because it occurred to me that with communication in the context of healthcare management one of my personal and professional passions there are levels through which the most skilled executive communicators must progress.

Just as in a computer game, learning how to manoeuvre your executive team successfully through a lower level provides you with considerable skill and knowledge to achieve your objectives when the situation is more complicated. The difference between the game and the reality, however, lies in the fact that in our real-life situations, a higher-level obstacle can pop up even before were really ready. And although many managers consider communication to be a tool to achieve consensus (in other words, to persuade others to their way of thinking!), healthcare communication goes way beyond persuasion.

Traditionally, communication for healthcare managers has focused almost exclusively on the technical and interpersonal level of communication skills. I submit that a clear-eyed focus on the more complex levels of communication strategic communication is long overdue.

I believe that my conclusion is supported by others:

Providers who are poor communicators are sued most often.

A solid HCMN [healthcare management] curriculum integrates the liberal arts general education requirements of communication (written and oral) with other skills required of managers

The next generation of [healthcare] managers should have effective communication skills (written and verbal)

and perhaps the most important observation of all

Very few advanced degree programs in health administration and medicine focus on teaching effective communication skills.

These observations coupled with the fact that basic textbooks on managerial skill building for healthcare management students usually devote fewer than ten pages to communication skills suggests that there is much still to be done in helping healthcare managers improve their knowledge and skills in the area of strategic communication.

Indeed, in the list of skills and/or knowledge that are being sought by employers in many business areas, including health care, communication skills both written and verbal are listed either number one or, less often, number two. In spite of the fact that communication skills are so highly valued, many healthcare managers still need help. Jamie Haeuser, chief operating officer of Womans Hospital in Baton Rouge (LA); and Paul Preston, a professor of management at the University of Montevallo (AL) (who is also the leader of the Sharpening Executive Skills seminar) have said the following:

Effective communications dont just happen they are the product of a sustained and focused effort to sharpen skills and hone abilities.

It seems clear that more resources are needed for both neophyte healthcare managers as well as their more experienced counterparts to assist them to develop those coveted communication skills.

When an earlier incarnation of this book was published way back in 2001, the communication landscape was vastly different. We had no idea of the extent to which digital media, new media, social media or whatever you might call it, would change public communication (and no less so personal communication) forever. The original purpose of Beyond Persuasion was to provide the readers with the knowledge, attitudes, and skills to use communication strategies and tactics to manage their organizations and their own relationships with important constituencies. Academic programs in health administration were sadly lacking in coursework on strategic communication at both the undergraduate and the graduate levels, and that has not changed. Many healthcare administrators are still unaware that they lack these important skills, the lack of which is magnified by the communication changes of the digital age. It would be something of an understatement to say that much in the world of communication and health care has changed since then.

Over the past dozen years as we have moved into the new millennium and have seen the penetration of the digital approach to communication, Ive made the following observations that lead me to believe that this information ought to be collected, added to basic strategic communication considerations, and become the book you now see.