What Does It Take to Lead? Article Critique Example

Part 1- Paragraph- One. Article Summary

This article written by the Healthcare Leadership Alliance asks a pertinent question encountered in healthcare management communities, what does it take to lead? In answering this question the writers theoretically placed the attributes required into five important domains. These domains outline the measurements through which successful outcomes can be assessed and disciplinary virtues of what it takes to lead are exposed.

They are identified as communication and leadership in management; professionalism; leadership; knowledge of the healthcare systems; business skills and management. In differentiating these qualities among health care professions, the article further specifies how measurements are designed to evaluate the competency of each domain. Three hundred competency statements have been developed which serve as measurements for what constitutes ‘what it takes to lead.’

Health care administration roles which fall under this three hundred measurement instruments are; hospital administration; medical practice administration; nursing administration; healthcare financial administration and health care information administration. Statements which inform the domain for communication and leadership in management competency reveal that this is assessed utilizing concepts pertaining to concise and clear communication with internal and external customers (HLA, 2012).

Leadership has to do with the ability to inspire individual and organizational excellence by creating a shared vision and managing change successfully for future development. Precisely, leadership according to HLA intersects with the other four domains.

Professionalism entails the ability for leaders to strategically align personal and organizational goals to ensure ethical standards are maintained. Knowledge of Health Care environment/ system requires that administrators understand the system which they manage. Business skills and management implies the ability to apply business principles including system principles into health care management styles (HLA, 2012).

Part 11-Paragraph- Two. Actual critique

To conduct a thorough critique of this article is to evaluate how relevant these domains posited by HealthCare Leadership Alliance are to twenty first century healthcare management systems. In examining communication and leadership in management competency as posited in the article; leadership appears to be the core element fusing all other four domains into relevance. Therefore, abilities to inspire would connote some degree of charismatic communication (Garman et al, 2012). Someone said alluding to people who have been born great that the same could be applied to leadership in organizations.

Some leaders are born to lead while others had it forced upon them by organizational protocol and some acquired the skills through training. As such, in discussing these five domains with leadership being the nucleus defining how well mangers function in the other domains based on the competencies outlined; these attributes must be considered valuable. Then in asking the question ‘what does it take to lead’ it is really about domains and competencies or there are other factors which HLA might have overlooked in their analysis?

For example, when the present health care system is scrutinized there is evidence of decline in money allotted towards management of important services which were supposed to be available and affordable to citizens. How would an administrator cope with patients arriving at an institution uninsured and without Medicaid or Medicare coverage? How could the five domains posited by Healthcare Leadership Alliance address this issue in the leadership domain competence model?

Definitely, understanding twenty-first century healthcare management systems or the environment can be beneficial. However, what type of outcome would it be if leaders in management circles have to make decisions that will cause patients to be denied quality health care due to their uninsured status? Therefore, it would appear that while the domain theory of leadership competency is useful it lacks the ability for leaders to be empathetic towards customers due to the political structure in which they function.

References

Healthcare Leadership Alliance (2012). What does it take to lead? HLA Document.USA

Garman Andrew, et.al (2012).Communication and relationship management. New York: Prentice Hall