Bombarded by constant and rapid change, healthcare organizations feel a sense of urgency to meet their needs for leaders. They rely on physicians to lead at all levels in their healthcare organizations. For them to successfully navigate today's healthcare environment, they require more than a medical education. To address this need, healthcare organizations are developing in-house leadership development programs.In this paper, I conduct a case study of physicians transitioning into leadership and their self-efficacy facilitated through an in-house leadership development program. Documentation, semi-structured interviews, and observations are examined to explore how physicians think about their leadership experiences following their participation in a six-month leadership development program.The study also explores at a high-level how these experiences influenced physician's self-efficacy as a first step in developing a theory of physician leadership and self-efficacy.

Companies are becoming increasingly dependent on teams to drive creativity and innovation, which usually involves multiple teams working together to solve complex problems However, the first problem is that work teams do not always manage creativity and innovation well, especially when partnering with other work teams on highly complex projects that demand greater interdependence and collaboration, which can constitute as much as 90% of today's organizational projects. The second problem is that researchers struggle to define and measure creativity and innovation for the past decade resulting in significant variation both within and between creativity and innovation scales that have restricted meaningful theoretical discoveries and advances. The current study is significant because it introduces a novel instrument derived by John Turner that measures team creativity and innovation processes as a single unit, thereby raising the level of theoretical sophistication and leading to better practical applications. After conducting factor analysis, the current study validates six factors, including 36 indicators, and measures team creativity and innovation processes as complex adaptive systems (CAS). The current study recommends deploying the new instrument in other sectors beyond the IT sector and using multilevel techniques that include the individual and executive/organization levels of analysis.

Many are beginning to see the promise that the quantum world has offered those who manage and lead organizations (Wheatley, 1992; Zohar, 1997). The Newtonian world is one in which all "things" are reduced to their smallest parts, separated, divided, and analyzed with predictability, with complete control being the ultimate goal. The quantum world is one of infinite possibilities, infinite fields of influence, and infinite relationships. The hallmark characteristics found in a manager who has been schooled in the quantum sciences are flexibility, responsiveness, synchronicity, serendipity, creativity, innovation, participation, and motivation. In a quantum organization there is the constant awareness of the whole system, but there is also diversity (wave or particle), which allows for self-organization that is based on the environment and its requirements. In the quantum world many paths lead from A to Z, and depending on the path chosen, numerous realities wait to unfold. It was the goal of this research to explore the changing of leader behaviors through exposure to the models and theories found in quantum physics. From a quantum perspective this behavior change is possible; the only question is the readiness, willingness, and ability of the leaders to allow their behaviors to be surfaced …

This study examined the signaling strength, or marketing power, of the most common qualifications of entry-level biomedical equipment technicians (BMETs) in Texas, based on stated hiring preferences of BMET managers, using order ranking of fictitious resumes. This study also sought to determine whether certification status, education background, military training background as a BMET, or type of employer [hospital or ISO] of the hiring manager had an effect on hiring preference for applicant qualifications of associate degree, military training as a BMET, or certified biomedical equipment technician (CBET) certification candidacy. Participants were asked to rank 16 fictitious resumes representing the most common qualifications of entry-level BMETs and to fill out a background questionnaire regarding their education, military, certification, and employer. The number of times each resume ranked in first place was tabulated and inter-rater reliability was calculated. Resumes with qualifications of associate degree versus military training as a BMET were compared at three levels of work experience. A chi-square test for independence was conducted for the comparisons to determine whether work experience influenced preference. Chi-square tests were also conducted for comparisons of associate degree with candidacy for CBET certification versus associate degree and military training with CBET candidacy versus military training. …

This qualitative study explored the overall impact of training HVAC technicians using the SightPros-VirTechs system for remote, wireless, internet video assistance at a small HVAC company, Metro Environmental. John Thomason, the president/co-owner developed a website and a new SightPros communication tool that allows wireless, one-on-one, just-in-time, high-quality, video-monitored instructions between an expert at one site and a technician at another site. Metro Environmental successfully used the SightPros-VirTechs system to train a new apprentice remotely. The apprentice and expert changed their normal and routine physical activities because the expert worked remotely and the apprentice worked on-site. Within just a few months, the apprentice proved competent enough to go to customer accounts without more experienced technicians nearby. The technicians express excitement about the SightPros communication tool as a way to contact remote experts whenever needed. The customer and business contacts also give good reviews and suggest other benefits. The expert permanently captures the communications so the company can use the saved video for many applications, especially training. The dissertation provides a list of recommendations to trainers/educators for similar applications.

Responding to globalization and its effects on education and research development, the Thai government decided to push all public universities to become autonomous and establish a system of quality assurances. The establishment of quality assurances has had a large impact on many Thai instructors, especially in new public universities. Thai instructors are now forced to more focus on conducting research because the number of research publications is regarded as one of the main criteria for quality universities. The purpose of this study is to investigate the key factors, at the individual and university levels, which impact on the instructors' behavior in conducting research of the full-time instructors in the faculty of Management Science from the Rajabhat Universities in Thailand. The current study will help explain how and why the instructors accept or refuse to conduct research and provide insight into the salient factors motivating the instructors to produce more research by conducting HLM. Data were collected from 694 participants at 37 institutions via a questionnaire survey. The findings revealed that there was no difference among these 37 universities on behavior in conducting research. The key factors statistically influencing behavior in conducting research of the instructors were facilitating conditions, academic degree, …

The purpose of business training programs is to improve performance, which improved performance changes leadership behaviors based on the knowledge, skills, and abilities (KSAs) learned in training. One of the most common criticisms of leadership training is the tendency to focus on teaching theory but not on applying theory into practice, that is, transfer of learning. Research usually ends at the point of identifying, describing, or measuring factors that influence transfer. Ongoing research must identify what constructs in the transfer of learning process should be effectively changed or managed. There is a gap in research on the degree to which performance improvement through KSAs learned in a simulation training program actually transfer to the work environment. Additional research is needed that examines the relationship between transfer of learning and intent to transfer, which are critical outcomes in the field of human resource management and development. The purpose of the study was to examine the relationship between intent to transfer and four constructs in the transfer of learning process during a simulation-based leadership training program. Participants completed self-report assessments that measured the relationships between intent to transfer and four constructs: ability, motivation, work environment, and learner readiness. A correlational design was …

This dissertation seeks to determine the differences between veteran and non-veteran students' mental effort and task difficulty within undergraduate online courses in Bachelor of Applied Arts and Sciences (BAAS) programs at three public Texas universities. The BAAS program is geared toward non-traditional students, which includes veterans. The courses are delivered in flexible formats, including online courses, face-to-face courses, and blended courses, which use a combination of online and face-to-face courses. After reviewing literature and utilizing both the cognitive theory of multimedia learning and the cognitive learning theory, a survey was conducted using undergraduate students enrolled in BAAS programs at three public Texas universities. The data was analyzed by conducting a factorial ANOVA and Pearson correlation to determine if there was a difference between veterans and non-veteran students' mental effort and task difficulty within online courses within the BAAS programs. The results indicated that that all three hypotheses failed to reject the null hypotheses that: (1) there is no difference in mental effort of students who had military service, versus those who did not have military service, (2) there is no difference in mental effort of students who had military service, versus those who did not have military service, and (3) …

This report analyses the NHES: 2005 data to present the state of American education in reference to “adult” participation in education. Psychosocial interaction theory is applied to the social event of attaining adulthood to analyze and report the propensity of American adults to participate in non-compulsory adult education. The review of the literature of perceptual demographic variables of adult attainment: age, prior education, subordinate responsibility, child-age dependent care, marital status, job stability, and home ownership. The analysis compares the data of participants and non-participants of non-compulsory adult education using binomial logistic regression analysis with tests, for a 95% confidence level and .05 significance. Included is a discussion of how appropriately aligned development opportunities and experiences may further increase education effectiveness and performance outcomes.

The study sample was composed of 110 teaching faculty at Vernon College, a multi-campus northwest Texas community college in Wichita Falls, TX. Participants completed two surveys: the Socio-communicative Orientation Scale (SCO) and the Teacher Satisfaction Scale (SAT). Demographic information was collected as well for generalizability purposes. As measured by the SCO, communicator style is a multi-dimensional concept including aspects of assertiveness and responsiveness communication behaviors; the assertiveness and responsiveness dimensions acted as independent variables. Instructor job satisfaction acted as the independent variable. The strength of the independent variables was measured separately in ratio to job satisfaction. Regression analysis results demonstrated that the assertiveness dimension of instructor communicator style is not a statistically significant contributor to instructor satisfaction. However, the responsiveness dimension can explain 12% of the variance in instructor job satisfaction. Beta weight and structure coefficient analysis confirmed the initial regression results for both independent variables. Further, commonality analysis clarified that the two independent variables within the study are in fact orthogonal in nature, meaning that they do not overlap and are not correlated. Hence, the responsiveness dimension of instructor communicator style is directly related to relationship building in an educational context and may be considered in professional development activities. …

The purpose of this study was to provide a snapshot of current Human Resources (HR) and Management curricula of four-year public universities in Texas in 2016 and evaluate their alignment with the competencies of the SHRM Competency Model®. This study used a mixed methods approach and analyzed course syllabi for a purposeful sample of 21 public universities in Texas. The course objectives referenced explicitly and/or implicitly all nine competencies. Three courses encompassed all nine competencies, and 84% of all programs demonstrated alignment with the competencies. “Business Acumen”, “Critical Evaluation”, “Communication” and “Relationship Management” were the most frequently referenced competencies in course syllabi. “Consultation” appeared the least frequently. This comprehensive analysis revealed that there is alignment between course curricula of public universities in Texas and competency expectations of graduates wishing to pursue a career in Human Resources. Recommendations applied to four areas including scholarship, university administration, professional associations, and practitioners.

To improve online learning pedagogy within the field of paralegal education, this study investigated how paralegal students and paralegal instructors perceived the effectiveness of synchronous and asynchronous online paralegal courses. Survey results were analyzed using independent samples t-test and correlational analysis, and indicated that overall, paralegal students and paralegal instructors positively perceived synchronous and asynchronous online paralegal courses. Paralegal instructors reported statistically significant higher perceptions than paralegal students: (1) of instructional design and course content in synchronous online paralegal courses; and (2) of technical assistance, communication, and course content in asynchronous online paralegal courses. Instructors also reported higher perceptions of the effectiveness of universal design, online instructional design, and course content in synchronous online paralegal courses than in asynchronous online paralegal courses. Paralegal students reported higher perceptions of asynchronous online paralegal course effectiveness regarding universal design than paralegal instructors. No statistically significant differences existed between paralegal students' perceptions of the effectiveness of synchronous and asynchronous online paralegal courses. A strong, negative relationship existed between paralegal students' age and their perceptions of effective synchronous paralegal courses, which were statistically and practically significant. Statistically significant relationships existed between paralegal instructors' perceptions of effective synchronous online paralegal course and the number of courses …

The primary purpose of this study was to test the theory of experiential learning by measuring to what extent work experience predicts the work ethic characteristics of students in baccalaureate nursing programs at three regional universities in Texas, including Midwestern State University in Wichita Falls, Tarleton State University in Stephenville, and West Texas A&M University in Canyon. Work experience is the amount full-time or part-time on-the-job experience. Work ethic attributes are referred to as considerate, ambitious, dependable, and cooperative. Results generated in this study failed to reject the null hypotheses, which means that work experience, does not provide evidence of the ability to predict the development of work ethic characteristics in baccalaureate nursing students who participated in this research study. Knowledge generated in this study provided alternative directions for future research with respect to the relationship between work experiences and work ethic characteristics in nursing students. Such research may be useful to nursing educators and trainers in the design and delivery phases of the educational process for nurses.

With the increasing use of social media by students, researchers, administrative staff, and faculty in post-secondary education (PSE), a number of institutions have developed guideline and policy documents to set standards for social media use. Social media platforms and applications have the potential to increase communication channels, support learning, enhance research, and encourage community engagement at PSE institutions. As social media implementation and administration has developed in PSE, there has been minimal assessment of the substance of social media guideline and policy documents. The first objective of this research study was to examine an accessible, online database (corpus) comprised of 24, 243 atomic social media guideline and policy text documents from 250 PSE institutions representing 10 countries to identify central attributes. To determine text meaning from topic extraction, a rotated latent semantic analysis (rLSA) method was applied. The second objective of this investigation was to determine if the distribution of topics analyze in the corpus differ by PSE institution geographic location. To analyze the diverging topics, the researcher utilized an iterative consensus-building algorithm.Through the maximum term frequencies, LSA determined a rotated 36-factor solution that identified common attributes and topics shared among the 24,243 social media guideline and policy atomic documents. …

The Online Student Connectedness Survey (OSCS) was introduced to the academic community in 2012 as an instrument designed to measure feelings of connectedness between students participating in online degree and certification programs. The purpose of this study was to examine data from the instrument for initial evidence of validity and reliability and to establish a nomological network between the OSCS and similar instruments utilized in the field. The study utilized sequential exploratory factor analysis- confirmatory factor analysis (EFA-CFA) and correlational analysis to assess results of the data. Students enrolled in online courses at higher education institutions located in the United States served as the sample for this study. Three instruments were used during the study. The OSCS was administered first so that the factor structure could be examined for factor validity. Once confirmed, the Classroom Community Scale (CCS) and the Community of Inquiry Scale (COI) served as the instruments to examine nomological validity through correlational analysis of data.This study provided evidence of factor validity and reliability for data from the OSCS. After the initial EFA-CFA, the four-factor structure held, and 16 of the 25 original items remained for nomological testing. Statistically significant correlations were demonstrated between factors contained in the …

This exploratory and descriptive study examines research articles published in ten of the top journals in the broad area of educational technology during the last 20 years: 1) Educational Technology Research and Development (ETR&D); 2) Instructional Science; 3) Journal of the Learning Sciences; 4) TechTrends; 5) Educational Technology: The Magazine for Managers of Change in Education; 6) Journal of Educational Technology & Society; 7) Computers and Education; 8) British Journal of Educational Technology (BJET); 9) Journal of Educational Computing Research; and 10) Journal of Research on Technology in Education. To discover research trends in the articles published from 1995-2014, abstracts from all contributing articles published in those ten prominent journals were analyzed to extract a latent semantic space of broad research areas, top authors, and top-cited publications. Concepts that have emerged, grown, or diminished in the field were noted in order to identify the most dominant in the last two decades; and the most frequent contributors to each journal as well as those who contributed to more than one of the journals studied were identified.

The purpose of this study was to identify the status and challenges of online distance education programs in post-secondary institutions in Ghana. This study was a replication of a similar study conducted in Kenya in 2009, at the University of Nairobi and Kenyatta University. This present study was conducted with an online survey using Google survey assessment. The survey requested responses from six post-secondary institutions in Ghana. Out of a total of 450 projected student responses, 309 responses were received with a 69% participation rate. A total of 14 responses were received for instructors out of a projected 30 resulting in 47% participation rate. And for administrators, 8 responses were received out of a projected 12 resulting in a 67% participation rate. Overall the study revealed that Ghana post-secondary institutions have established and incorporated online distance education into their programs, offering both online and blended courses. Some of these institutions established regional centers across the country and incorporated foreign instructors into their programs. The survey also revealed that students were satisfied with the overall online distance education program in their institutions which included the level of instruction, feedback and evaluation. However, there were still challenges revealed from the study that …

This study looked at leadership development at top performing nuclear plants in the United States. The examination of leadership development as actually practiced in the nuclear energy industry lead to the development of a best practice model. The nuclear industry is self-regulated through the Institute for Nuclear Power Operations (INPO). INPO has been evaluating nuclear plants over the past 15 years. Recently they have identified supervisor performance as a key factor in poor plant performance. INPO created a model for leadership development called Growing Industry Leaders. The nuclear industry has identified its aging workforce and subsequent loss of leadership as an emerging issue facing the nuclear industry in the next five to ten years. This initiative was aimed at both the supervisor shortfalls identified through plant evaluations and the state of the workforce within the nuclear industry. This research evaluated the elements of this model and compared them to a model of best practice. This research answered the following questions: What elements of leadership development should be included in leadership development programs? What would a model of best practice in leadership development look like? Data was collected from nine out of 103 top performing plants. Development activities were categorized by …

Over the last 5 decades, the retrospective pretest has been used in behavioral science research to battle key threats to the internal validity of posttest-only control-group and pretest-posttest only designs. The purpose of this study was to compare outcome measures resulting from four research design implementations incorporating the retrospective pretest: (a) pre-post-then, (b) pre-post/then, (c) post-then, and (d) post/then. The study analyzed the interaction effect of pretest sensitization and post-intervention survey order on two subjective measures: (a) a control measure not related to the intervention and (b) an experimental measure consistent with the intervention. Validity of subjective measurement outcomes were assessed by correlating resulting to objective performance measurement outcomes. A Situational Leadership® II (SLII) training workshop served as the intervention. The Work Involvement Scale of the self version of the Survey of Management Practices Survey served as the subjective control measure. The Clarification of Goals and Objectives Scale of the self version of the Survey of Management Practices Survey served as the subjective experimental measure. The Effectiveness Scale of the self version of the Leader Behavior Analysis II® served as the objective performance measure. This study detected differences in measurement outcomes from SLII participant responses to an experimental and a …

Patient satisfaction dimensions have a wide ranging and significant impact on organizational performance in the healthcare industry. In addition, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services Hospital Value Based Purchasing (HVBP) Program links patient satisfaction to Medicare reimbursement, putting millions of dollars at risk for health systems. A gap in the literature exists in the exploration of how a patient's experience in the emergency department affects their satisfaction with inpatient services. In a multiple regression analysis, the relationship between HVBP Patient Experience of Care and hospital level factors including emergency department wait times are explored. Results indicate a statistically significant relationship between hospital level factors and standardized measure of patient satisfaction with a moderate adjusted effect size (p= <.0001, R2 adjusted= 0.184). Emergency department wait times post physician admit orders were most salient in predicting patient satisfaction scores (rs2= 0.434, β= -0.334, p= <.001). Recommendations to improve emergency department wait times include focusing on key decision points and implementation of electronic systems to support the movement of admitted patients out of the emergency department as quickly as possible.

The purpose of this study was to examine whether there are significant relationships between the general satisfaction of students and learner-content interaction, learner-instructor interaction, learner-learner interaction, and learner-technology interaction in 100% online courses. There were 310 responses from the students. This study did not use data from duplicate students and instructors. Excel was used to find duplicate students and instructors; therefore, 128 responses were deleted. After examination of box plots, an additional four cases were removed because they were outliers on seven or more variables. Nineteen responses were deleted because they did not answer all questions of interest, resulting in a total sample of 159 students. Multiple regression analysis was used to examine the relationship between the four independent variables and the dependent variable. In addition to tests for statistical significance, practical significance was evaluated with the multiple R2 , which reported the common variance between independent variables and dependent variable. The two variables of learner-content and learner-instructor interaction play a significant role in predicting online satisfaction. Minimally, the variable learner-technology can predict online satisfaction and is an important construct that must be considered when offering online courses. Results of this study provide help in establishing a valid and reliable …

Undergraduate nursing students face tremendous stress in regards to academic and clinical demands while emotional intelligence (EI) is a topic of interest in the nursing field. This study examined whether problem-focused coping methods for stress are related to ability and personality. In this study, EI represented ability and locus of control (LOC) represented personality. Confrontive coping, seeking social support, and planful problem-solving represented the problem-focused coping variables. A survey instrument which represented a combination of the Assessing Emotions Scale, Perceived Stress Scale, Ways of Coping Scale (Revised), and the Rotter Locus of Control Scale was administered to 11 undergraduate nursing schools during the spring semester of 2019. The results indicated that EI had strong and statistically significant correlations with each of the other variables in the study which were LOC, stress, confrontive coping, seeking social support, and planful problem-solving. The results further supported that EI was a statistically significant predictor for each of the three problem-focused coping variables. It was concluded that level of stress did not mediate the relationship between EI and any of the three problem-focused coping methods. In addition, LOC moderated the relationship between EI and stress. The limitations and possibilities for future research are addressed in …

Globalization in the past few decades has been marked by increased mobility of highly skilled workers from one country to another. Even though self-initiated expatriation is a widespread phenomenon, it is a relatively under-researched phenomenon in the academic literature, especially in an organizational context. Existing literature shows that not all individuals are equally suited to embark on a new life in another country, and self-initiated expatriates (SIEs) could be particularly susceptible to failure since they have no support from a home organization. This study was designed to investigate the experiences of self-initiated professional expatriates and the effect it had on their work performance. The purpose was to understand how their organizational and social experience affected their cross-cultural adjustment process and in turn affected their individual work performance. The researcher used a qualitative method using semi-structured interviews, observations, and documents with ten self-initiated expatriates. This study contributed to the expanding literature on the experiences of self-initiated expatriates, specifically how different support systems affected cross-cultural adjustment and individual work performance.

Self-concept, discussed as a scholarly topic since the time of Socrates and Plato, is an important theoretical construct in education because self-concept is considered to be a desirable trait and a facilitator of positive future behavior. The purpose of this study was to examine the relationship between the characteristics of students enrolled in career and technical education (CTE) programs and students' self-concept scores as measured by specific subscales from the Self-Description Questionnaire (SDQ). A total of 196 male and 89 female secondary students (Grades 9-12) enrolled in arts, audio/video technology and communications cluster courses in North Central Texas school districts participated in the study. Student characteristic variables of interest were age, gender, CTE program enrollment, and participation in CTE. The self-concept subscales analyzed were General, Academic, Verbal, Math, and Problem Solving. A canonical correlation analysis was conducted using the four student characteristic variables as predictors of the five self-concept variables to evaluate the multivariate shared relationship between the two variable sets. The full model across all functions explained about 23% of the variance between the variable sets. Function 1 explained 15% of the shared variance and Function 2 explained 7% of the variance that remained. This study detected a relationship …