Forward-thinking leaders must learn how to effectively direct and manage their team’s efforts within the environment in which their team and organization function, as well as what mechanisms exist to influence that environment toward positive change. Effective leaders in health care have knowledge and awareness of health policy as it shapes the environment in which all of health care functions. Health policy encompasses regulation and licensure, education and deployment of the health workforce, public health systems, the legislative process and health legislation such as the Affordable Care Act (ACA), as well as state and federal health programs such as Medicare and Medicaid and the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP). In this course, students will explore the policy environment both inside and outside their organization’s vertical structure, and identify opportunities for initiating structural change. Interactive assignments will build students’ capacity to create and apply strategies to locate and apply relevant health policy knowledge through in a combination of classroom and real-world, team-based case studies and peer-facilitated simulations and debriefings.
- Instructor: Beth Mertz