What Is Your Leadership Style Interview and Summary Paper

Assignment description:Complete another informational interview with a manager other than your preceptor, in an
area of interest. Use the questions in our syllabus and add your own questions again as
well. To optimize your experience, you may arrange for a job shadow in addition to the
interview if they are open to having you spend more time as scheduled. (IMPORTANT
NOTE: The job shadowing option is not available for most interns after spring break.)
Job shadowing resource: how to job shadow-1.pdf
Format for informational interview and summary paper:
Your Name:
Name of Preceptor/Supervisor Interviewed:
Title of Preceptor/Supervisor Interviewed:
Date of Informational Interview:
1. Describe your agency, its purpose and rationale, history and funding sources. What is the
specific population served? What is the general service area, in terms of geography (e.g.,
Milwaukee county, Southeastern Wisconsin, etc.)? How many persons are served each
year, on average? Also include a physical description of the building and location.
2. Describe your role in the agency. (Obtain an organizational chart, or create one yourself.)
3. Evaluate your agency or department/area in terms of its stated goals. In your opinion,
how is the agency/department functioning and are its stated goals being met?
4. What goals do you have personally, that relate to health care administration or
leadership?
5. What is your leadership style?
6. What motivates you?
7. Describe your own leadership journey. What was your work experience and community
involvement prior to your current role, and what do you recommend regarding grad
school?
8. What is your vision for your agency, department/area, and the impact of health care
policy?
9. What do you enjoy most about your role, and what do you consider to be your greatest
challenge?
10. Do you recommend joining any specific professional associations, and what advice do you
have for future health care administrators?
Other: Based on class work and your own interests, you will develop a set of 2-3 additional
questions to learn more about the organization and/or leader interviewed. Ask your
preceptor to help you make contacts and schedule additional informational interviews in
areas of interest to you personally. During your 2nd and 3rdinformational interviews, adapt the
questions as needed to gain the most personally.
FINAL NOTE: Remember to close the interview by expressing your appreciation for the
interviewee’s time and for sharing their insights and personal leadership
journey. Summarize your interview responses briefly, and upload the summary to Canvas
along with the actual questions and answers from your interview. Link to your ePortfolio.
Assignment Details
Informational Interview: The purpose of the organization interview is for you to gain an
understanding of the complete range of services that the organization provides, the
population the organization serves, and the organizational structure; as well as the leadership
journey of your preceptor. This is a structured interview. You will be interviewing your
preceptor for this initial Informational Interview, and focus on the leadership journey for
additional informational interviews with leaders in other areas of interest. If there is an
orientation for new staff or volunteers available for you to attend in addition to your
department orientation with your preceptor, many of the questions from this initial
questionnaire may be answered at that time. If several students are at the same site, please
try to coordinate the scheduling of an interview with the program director. Upload a
summary of each informational interview to Canvas ,and attach the questions and answers to
your typed summary by the due date in our syllabus; refer to our course syllabus for
additional details. Your papers should be uploaded to your ePortfolio.
STRUCTURED INTERVIEW FORMAT:
Your Name:
Name of Preceptor/Supervisor Interviewed:
Title of Preceptor/Supervisor Interviewed: Director of Quality Management
Date of Informational Interview: Feb-4-2020
1. Describe your agency, its purpose and rationale, history and funding sources. What is the
specific population served? What is the general service area, in terms of geography (e.g.,
Milwaukee county, Southeastern Wisconsin, etc.)? How many persons are served each
year, on average? Also include a physical description of the building and location.
1. Advocate Aurora Health Care is a large not-for-profit organization serving
patients from southern Illinois up beyond Green Bay, WI. The organization
consists of 27 hospitals and many clinics. In 2019, I believe, we served just
under 1 million unique patients. Sinai Medical Center is the last standing
downtown hospital in Milwaukee. In 2019- 60,000 patients were seen in our
ED, about 2300 babies were born and our outpatient volume hit near record
highs. Aurora Sinai’s campus sits on 12th and State and consists of a main
hospital building, a physician’s office space, research institute, administrative
building and an additional outpatient building.
2. Describe your role in the agency. (Obtain an organizational chart,or create one yourself.)
1. See the organization chart shared earlier for the greater picture. At Sinai
specifically, my role rolls up to the Chief Medical Officer (CMO) at the
hospital. My key function is to assure the hospital is complying to with federal
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regulations (set forth by CMS) and maintain high quality care delivery. This is
obviously rather summarized, but it provides a broad overview.
Evaluate your agency or department/area in terms of its stated goals. In your opinion,
how is the agency/department functioning and are its stated goals being met?
1. Healthcare is changing, constantly. Thus, goals are always moving targets. As
we improve, the targets stretch. Our hospital, overall, performs well in quality
metrics. Historically, we have performed well in our value-based purchasing,
earning supplemental repayment; however, in the past we have also received
penalties for hospital-acquired conditions. Regardless of where we are current
state, we are always moving forward and continuing to improve.
What goals do you have personally, that relate to health care administration or
leadership?
1. My job as a leader in healthcare is to do what I can to keep every single patient
at my hospitals safe. As a leader, in general, it is my job to grow my peoplemeaning give them the tools to do the jobs well while also assuring I am
challenging them and helping them develop professional.
What is your leadership style?
1. I would say that my style is transformational and participative. I feel as a
leader, I need to know my team and provide assignments based on their skills.
Part of knowing the team is truly understanding what keeps them engaged and
happy at work. While I fully trust my team to do what is right, they also
understand that I will step in should they not be meeting goals, etc.
What motivates you?
1. Making healthcare safer. Too many people come into the hospital and either
experience an error, get an infection, have an adverse event- the list goes on. I
want to make my hospitals a place that I would happily receive care or send
my family/friends for care.
Describe your own leadership journey. What was your work experience and community
involvement prior to your current role, and what do you recommend regarding grad
school?
1. I received my Bachelor’s of Science in Nursing degree in December 2008.
While I was in school, I was working in the PICU (pediatric intensive care
unit) at Children’s Hospital of WI, and continued to do so after graduation. In
August 2010, I took an additional job in the ED at Aurora St. Luke’s South
Shore. November 2013 I decided to make the big leap away from the bedside
when I accepted a Nurse Educator position in the ED at Aurora Sinai. As the
educator I worked hard to improve the flow through the department, the care
of our stroke patients and rolled out the sepsis bundle. In doing so, I
discovered my love of process improvement and leadership. I have been in my
current role since July 2016. I graduated with my Master’s of Science in
Nursing, Systems Leadership and Healthcare Quality in December 2018. I
found graduate to school to be incredibly valuable. Unlike undergrad, you are
learning aside kindred spirits. These are people who have been, and are going
similar places you are professionally. I found that the experiential learning
from this was absolutely invaluable. More practically, in my career trajectory,
a Master’s degree was going to eventually be needed to progress!
8. What is your vision for your agency, department/area, and the impact of health care
policy?
1. To quote our CEO Jim, “to be a safe enterprise, always”. One of the great
things about our merger is that we now have a seat at the table to truly help
influence policy. Our system’s chief nurse is the president of the American
Nurses’ Association and other key leaders hold similar roles in their respective
discipline.
9. What do you enjoy most about your role, and what do you consider to be your greatest
challenge?
1. Hands down, the greatest challenge are threats to reimbursement. You cannot
deliver care, without funding. Additionally challenging, is how much patients’
behaviors and choices influence their outcomes, thus putting an organization’s
outcome data at risk. There is only so much within our “zone of control”. I
love that most days, I have no idea what I might encounter that day. I love
that it is different every day. It keeps me interested and on my toes.
10. Do you recommend joining any specific professional associations, and what advice do you
have for future health care administrators?
1. READ- anything and everything. Listen to the news, the radio, podcastswhatever! However, be sure that it is a valid source. As far as joining an
association, I think it all depends on the person. I am part of a couple different
organizations. I primarily participate by reading their publications, as that is
all time permits. As my family ages more, and time allows, I envision getting
more involved.
11. Other: Based on class work and your own interests, you will develop a set of 2-3
additional questions to learn more about the organization and/or leader interviewed. Ask
your preceptor to help you make contacts and schedule additional informational
interviews in areas of interest to you personally. During your 2nd and 3rd informational
interviews, adapt the questions as needed to gain the most personally.
FINAL NOTE: Remember to close the interview by expressing your appreciation for the
interviewee’s time and for sharing their insights and personal leadership
journey. Summarize your interview responses briefly, and upload the summary to Canvas
along with the actual questions and answers from your interview. Link to your ePortfolio.