Moving Beyond the Basics of Strategic Planning: The Board’s Role
Moving Beyond the Basics of Strategic Planning: The Board’s Role “Strategy is a word that gets used in so many ways with so many meanings that it can end up being meaningless.”1 This quotation by Harvard Business School professor and well-known author Michael Porter...
Clarifying Board Roles: Emerging Best Practices in System vs. Subsidiary Board Duties
Clarifying Board Roles: Emerging Best Practices in System vs. Subsidiary Board Duties Last winter, I facilitated a Governance Institute educational session with hospital board members entitled “Board Basics for Effective Governance.” Expecting most participants to be...
Competency-Based Board Recruitment: How to Get the Right People on the Board
Competency-Based Board Recruitment: How to Get the Right People on the Board Recent Governance Institute research showed a positive correlation between a hospital’s or health system’s quality scores and the board’s use of competency-based criteria when selecting new...
Board Orientation Manual
Board Orientation Manual: Providing Essential Knowledge and Solutions to Achieve Excellence in Healthcare Governance, Fifth Ed. As a new board member, you are beginning a period of service that brings with it prestige, credibility, influence, and personal...
The Right Fit: Stand-Alones and Small Systems Must Get the Questions Right
The Right Fit: Stand-Alones and Small Systems Must Get the Questions Right When the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the Affordable Care Act (ACA) in June 2012, leaders across the health care industry saw that reform not only was here to stay, but it would be accompanied by...
Financial Viability: The Challenges of Living in Two Worlds
Financial Viability: The Challenges of Living in Two Worlds “If they just gave us a clear set of rules, we would be able to figure out what to do!” This lament has never been more true for hospital board leaders, executives, and physicians. We often hear that the...
Investing Capital in Uncertain Times: The Board’s Role
Investing Capital in Uncertain Times: The Board's Role Hospitals have just come off the greatest construction spending spree since the 1950s, when both the post-war economy and the population were booming. Just a year ago, the annual survey by Health Facilities...
Obamacare: Myth versus Reality
Obamacare: Myth versus Reality With the results of the 2008 Presidential and Congressional elections now in the history books, the winners must look ahead to implementing the changes they promised during their campaigns. Much has been written about the various...
Financing Options for Small or Rural Hospitals (Part 1)
Financing Options for Small or Rural Hospitals This article is Part I of a two‐part series. The purpose of the series is to highlight the capital financing options available to small or rural hospitals, including the risks associated with the most common approaches....
Financing Options for Small and Rural Hospitals (Part 2)
Financing Options for Small or Rural Hospitals This article is Part 2 of a two‐part series highlighting the capital financing options available to small or rural hospitals, including the risks associated with the most common approaches. Part 1 (August 2008) focused on...