HCM 490 Final Project Guidelines and Rubric

Overview

The final project for this course is the creation of a Strategic Plan Presentation and Professional Reflection. The healthcare industry is constantly changing and healthcare professionals should be prepared for the challenge. As the final stop in your journey toward your Bachelor of Science in Healthcare Administration, you will integrate the knowledge and skills you have developed in previous coursework and over the duration of the term into a Capstone Assessment. Your assessment will consist of two components that will allow you to evidence knowledge, skills, abilities, and dispositional growth you have experienced during your program.

In the first component, you will select an existing healthcare organization that fits one of the following areas of opportunity and develop a comprehensive strategic plan for this change.

1. Option 1: Organization is Offering a New Service – Create a strategic plan that will guide the organization in bringing to fruition a new service, such as offering portable MRIs, starting a new urgent care clinic, opening a new outpatient surgery center, etc.
2. Option 2: Organization is Expanding an Existing Service Area – Create a strategic plan that will guide the organization in expanding an existing service to an underserved population that needs attention in this area. Examples include: population that has limited access to primary care services, population-to-provider ratio indicating a shortage, groups of persons who face economic, cultural, or linguistic barriers to healthcare in the local area and reside in a specific geographic area, and so on

The second component of your Capstone assessment is a professional reflection, in which you will reflect upon your capstone, program, and professional experiences and draw connections and inferences about your growth, ethical practice, and professional goals.

Evaluation of Capstone
This capstone will be assessed somewhat differently than other courses you have taken online at SNHU. There are two (2) separate components which will be submitted at different times during the course; however, they all operate together to comprise the whole capstone experience and are not assessed separately. You will be evaluated on both as a unit in determining whether you have demonstrated proficiency in each outcome. Your instructor will guide you through this process, keeping a running narrative of your strengths and weaknesses in relation to the outcomes as you progress through the class. You must demonstrate proficiency in all six (6) outcomes to pass this capstone course. Your work is expected to meet the highest professional standards.

The project is divided into five milestones, which will be submitted at various points throughout the course to scaffold learning and ensure quality final submissions. These milestones will be submitted in Modules One, Two, Three, Four, and Five. The final product will be submitted in Module Seven and Eight.

In this assignment, you will demonstrate your mastery of the following course outcomes:

• Engage diverse healthcare stakeholders using communications that reflect keen interpersonal skills, effective collaboration practices, and deep cultural competence
• Demonstrate knowledge of microeconomic, macroeconomic and financial principles through monitoring and utilization of financial and economic data for decision-making and strategic planning
• Utilize principles and functions of management to interpret market analyses for strategic planning and to foster organizational development, promote effective use of human resources, and enhance operations
• Propose recommendations to improve the effectiveness and integration of information management systems at the various levels of healthcare organizations and achieve organizational goals
• Assess contemporary policies, regulations, and governance structures relevant to the United States healthcare delivery system for their impacts to populations’ health and their implications for ethical decision-making
• Promote dynamic organizational cultures that establish strategic visions, methodically analyze and interpret data based on sound epidemiological and statistical principles, and embrace change for continuous healthcare quality improvement

Prompt

After choosing the topic for your course project, you will work to develop the three phases of your strategic plan: the introduction and assessment phase, the implementation, communication, and management phase, and finally the evaluation phase. The final strategic plan consists of a PowerPoint presentation including speaker notes and voice over. This first component will also inform your professional reflection, in which you will evaluate your experiences in this program, capstone experience, and field of interest, and discuss the importance and impact of ethical practice in healthcare.

Capstone Component 1: Strategic Plan
Your strategic plan must be submitted in the form of a comprehensive presentation to the Board of Directors of your selected institution for approval and buyin. You have the flexibility to utilize PowerPoint or another comparable presentation tool as long as your instructor approves the submission file. Your presentation is expected be professionally crafted to the needs and specifications appropriate for the discipline, area of interest, and type of initiative you are proposing. Because your strategic plan will be different from others’ in your capstone experience, you will likely include different additional resources, information, visuals, and strategies for progress. At minimum, your presentation must address/include the following:

1. Phase I – Introduction and Assessment — In this section you will give background on your organization, introduce the project that precipitates the strategic plan and what your assessment tools and approach will be. Your introduction and assessment should include:
   1. The mission, vision, values statements, structure, and current community position of the organization.
   2. Project topic that is the focus of the strategic plan, including the goal(s) of this project.
   3. An appropriate analysis tool to assess the impact of your project on your organization.
   4. The effect of internal and external factors on the feasibility and development of the project.
2. Phase II – Implementation and Communication Plans
   1. Target area or intended population and establish the goals.
   2. The timeline and implementation milestones of the initiative.
   3. Financial impact of the initiative, including any necessary capital expenditures, necessary fundraising, or potential financial benefits.
   4. Resources needed to effectively implement the initiative, including staffing, equipment, technology needs, and so forth.
   5. Compliance with all federal and state regulations relevant to the proposed plan.
   6. Potential ethical challenges and formulate plans for monitoring behavior, practices, procedures, and so forth.
   1. Implementation Plan: Provide a comprehensive plan for implementation that includes:
   2. Communication and Management Strategy: Your total communication plan should address the strategies and practices you will employ to communicate to the proper stakeholders at the proper times. In this section you should detail your comprehensive approach for how you will communicate this change and its impact, how you will keep people informed of the project’s progress, and how you will keep them informed of the project’s ongoing results.
3. Phase III – Evaluation Strategy: This plan for managing and measuring progress and success of your initiative should include the following:
   1. A discussion of the specific goals and milestones of implementation of the initiative. Lay out your goals in a clear, obtainable fashion and to ensure that progress milestones are clear, reasonable, and consistent.
   2. Specific definitions of measures of progress towards obtaining the intended goals and a description of the tools that you would use to measure progress. What strategies will be used to measure success, and how will adjustments be made should progress towards these goals fall short or change?
   3. How do you intend to collect and analyze information to ascertain stakeholder satisfaction with the initiative? What information will be looked at, and who are the stakeholders that will be considered?

Capstone Component 2: Professional Reflection
For the second and final component of your capstone, you will write an essay in which you discuss the process and outcomes of this project and your overall Healthcare Administration Program journey and experiences. You will also speak more specifically about how the project relates to your area of expertise/interest and your desired career path. Writing reflectively allows you to think deeply and consciously about your experiences, which is invaluable to successful practice in the field of healthcare administration.

You should envision this component as a personal reflection on the capstone and your experience in the Healthcare Administration program as a whole. For instance, relative to the capstone, you could discuss what you did—or intended to do—and then consider what worked well, what challenges you faced, and what you would change or do differently to make your experience better. In reflecting on your time here at SNHU, you might discuss where you started, where you have ended up, where you see yourself going, etc. Note that this component is not about evaluating the capstone itself, but rather, your experience within the capstone project.

Some of the issues to address in this final component of this capstone may include, but are not limited to:

• Overall, what was your capstone experience like?
• Reflect on the significance of the capstone in relation to your own experience at SNHU.
• How will you relate cultural competence or maintain cultural principles in your profession?
• How does your application of interpersonal skills and collaborative processes relate to your professional goals?
• How will you promote continuous healthcare quality improvement in your professional life?

What to Submit

Your Strategic Plan will be submitted in the form of a presentation. You may use Powerpoint to prepare the visuals for your presentation. You also have submit presentation speaker notes. Your Professional Reflection should be submitted in the form of a well-crafted, reflective essay, most likely consisting of 3 pages. For both submission artifacts, you should properly cite research and references in discipline-appropriate format.

The “Possible Indicators of Success” are examples for you and the instructor of the types of concepts to look for to demonstrate proficiency. They are neither exhaustive nor prescriptive, and should be used as guides for illustrating how your capstone embodies the outcome. You must show proficiency in all six (6) outcomes to be successful in the capstone course.