From Management to Leadership: Strategies for Transforming Health, 3rd Edition

Facilitating the Processes of Change and Transition

We now turn to the interrelated processes of change and transition, which create significant challenges for leaders. Change today is faster than ever before and promises to continue accelerating well into future decades. The continual onslaught of technological improvements has altered the very nature of work. Service delivery is rapidly shifting from acute hospital care to ambulatory, home care, and even Internet-based services. Health care services are moving from a residency-based to a mobility-based model (Porter-O’Grady and Malloch, 2003). The rapid rate of mergers and acquisitions in the 1990s resulted in fewer and fewer stand-alone, independent health care organizations and continues ...