Positive and Negative Perceptions of Diffusion Related...
Transcript of Positive and Negative Perceptions of Diffusion Related...
© 2012 | WORK, FAMILY & HEALTH NETWORK
Positive and Negative Perceptions of
Diffusion Related Attributes from
Users of a Workplace Intervention:
Evidence from the WFHN Study
Ginger C Hanson, PhD
Bonnie A. Leeman-Castillo, PhD
James W. Dearing, PhD
Mary L. Durham, PhD
© 2012 | WORK, FAMILY & HEALTH NETWORK
Members
The University of Minnesota
Penn State University
Harvard University
Portland State University
Purdue University
Kaiser Permanente
Michigan State Universtity
RTI International
University of Southern California
Supporting Partners
The Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child
Health & Human Development (NICHD)
Regina Bures, Program Official
Rosalind Berkowitz King, Project Scientist
Centers for Disease Control & Prevention (CDC)/
National Institute for Ocupational Safey & Health
(NIOSH)
Casey Chosewood,
Senior Medical Officer for Total Worker Health
National Institute on Aging
Lis Nielsen, Program Official
The Office of Behavioral and Social Sciences Research
(OBSSR)
Tisha Wiley, Program Official
Grants from the William T. Grant Foundation and the
Administration for Children and Families have provided
additional funding.
Work-Life Innovations
■ The number of employers who are offering increased
control over where and when employees work
continues to increase (Matos & Galinsky, 2014)
■ A growing number of vendors offering work-life
innovations that have not been rigorously tested
■ There is a growing interest among work-life
researchers in developing and/or testing new work-life
innovations (Bailyn et al., 2006 Hammer et al., 2011, Kelly et
al., 2011, Moen et al., 2011, & Rapport et al., 2002)
Dissemination and Diffusion
■ In other fields (medicine, social work), many evidence-
based innovations are developed but do not get widely
adopted by practitioners
■ Dissemination: purposive passive and active
communication (push) to potential adopters (Dearing &
Kreuter, 2010)
■ Diffusion: reaction of target segment of adopters as a
result of curiosity, perceived value, ease of access,
and positive status association (pull) (Dearing, 2008)
Creating Pull by Studying Perceptions of Intervention Attributes
■ Effectiveness is just one of several attributes that
affect adoption decisions
■ Other important attributes: cost, simplicity,
compatibility, observability, trialability (Rogers, 1995)
■ Study of attributes can:
■ Inform modifications that may increase diffusion
■ Predict or explain diffusion
■ Help shape dissemination messages
Innovation Attributes for Diffusion (Rogers, 2010)
■ Effectiveness: Achieves the objectives for which it was designed
■ Observability: Outcomes easily seen by others
■ Adaptability: Can be customized to better meet adopters needs
■ Compatibility: Consistent with values & needs of users, current
policies and procedures, workplace culture
■ Cost: Resources, FTE, time, lost productivity, opportunity costs
■ Simplicity: How difficult it is to understand, learn, use
■ Trialability: Ability to try out little by little or without incurring cost
■
Industry Partners
STAR Office:“TOMO” – Information Technology (IT) division – Large, well-established company – One primary location with other satellites – Some work groups get STAR, others continue
usual practice
STAR Healthcare: “LEEF” – For-profit Health Care (HC) provider – Included 30 extended care facilities total – Some sites get STAR, others continue usual
practice
More about methods Bray et al., (2013) RTI Press
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STAR Office Rollout: IT
Wave 1 survey
Sludge Session Culture Clinic Session
Managers Only Session
Wave 2 survey
Leadership Education Session
Kick-Off Session
Mgr
training
&
tracking
Mgr
tracking
Do
Something
Scary Poll
Forum Session
Sludge
Eradication
Poll
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More about logic model in King et al. (2012). Handbook of Occupational Health & Wellness
More about the intervention in Kossek et al. (2014). Organizational Dynamics
Customization of STAR for Health Care
■ Customized messages: ■ Changed some guideposts (e.g., ‘Every day feels
like your day off.’)
■ Added guiding principle for any change:
■ Safe, Legal, and Cost Neutral
■ Focused on handling schedule conflicts, “call outs”
and shift trades in fair, transparent way
■ Customized process ■ Steering teams ■ Broke up sessions—more and shorter
■ More about customization in Kossek et al. (In press). Occupational Health
Disparities among Racial and Ethnic Minorities
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STAR/T Attributes Study Methods
Using formal feedback interviews
Subset of LEEF Administrators (5) & TOMO Managers (5)
Identify evaluative phrases
Unit=Interviewees answer
Refers to STAR
Valiance (+ or -)
Coded attribute (e.g. effectiveness, observability, adaptability,
compatibility, cost, simplicity, trialability)
Identified sub-themes by attribute to illustrate + and - examples
Two coders code each transcript and discuss disagreements
Effectiveness Positive
■ Both Industries
■ WeSupport tracking helped managers see where they were doing well and where
there was room for improvement
■ STAR reduced sludge and sludge defensiveness thereby reducing guilt
■ STAR: Office
■ Telecommuting and schedule control helped employees use their time more
efficiently to meet work and family demands.
■ STAR reduced unnecessary participation in meetings
■ Managers set meaningful timelines rather than creating unnecessary urgency
■ Star: Healthcare
■ Giving staff more decision authority and schedule control allowed them to generate
useful solutions to long standing staffing problems
■ STAR helped to increase employee satisfaction
Effectiveness: Negative
■ Star: Healthcare
■ Conflicting expectations between STAR and leadership caused administrator confusion and stress
Leadership STAR
Observability Positive
■ STAR: Office
■ Changes in the level of telecommuting and schedule control are
noticeable, but there is variability in use
■ When employee can manage their own time they are more
willing to work long hours under tight deadlines
■ Star: Healthcare
■ Allowing employees to trade shifts or find their own coverage
decreased unplanned schedule gaps (e.g., call outs, tardies)
■ Improved communication within teams and with manager
■ People are more comfortable having professional discussions about
issues and concerns (reduced sludge and increase decision authority)
■ “Sludge” and the ability to make any change that is “safe, legal, and
cost neutral” have entered into the everyday language
Observability: Negative
■ STAR: Office
■ A small number of employees have performance issues in a STAR
environment (e.g., not being accessible, missing deadlines)
■ Some people missed the opportunity to have casual face-to-face
conversations about the work
■ Some people still felt it was necessary to provide a “legitimate”
excuse for using schedule control or flexibility
■ Star: Healthcare
■ There was concern that the increased schedule control was a tactic
to reduce overtime, which some staff depend on
■ The norms emphasizing punctuality were difficult to change
Compatibility: Positive
■ Both Industries
■ The WeSupport tracking helped managers achieve desired changes
such as supporting employees in the way they knew they should
■ STAR legitimized consistent use of informal practices that were
already used by some supervisors
■ STAR: Office
■ Telecommuting and schedule control fit employee’s needs
■ Fits the way work is done today: remote access, smart phones, etc
■ Star: Healthcare
■ The organization wanted to empower employees to make decisions
and STAR helped them achieve that
■ Communication with interviewees about START assures that new
candidates are a good fit and improves retention
Compatibility: Negative
■ Both Industries
■ Mangers/Administrators did not see enough evidence that leadership
fully supported STAR
■ STAR: Office
■ There is a need for teams to agree on expectations about
accessibility
■ Sometimes the nature of work makes telecommuting difficult
■ Star: Healthcare
■ Workload was a barrier to participation in the STAR sessions
■ Some STAR principles were perceived by administrators to be
inconsistent with some leadership goals
Adaptability: Positive
■ STAR: Office
■ Some managers initiated extra meetings or provided additional
clarification
■ When the is job “done”
■ When employees can utilize their schedule control and how much is
appropriate
■ Expected response time on an email
■ When and how to let others know when you are available
■ Star: Healthcare
■ Some facilities added additional sessions
■ Some facilities added STAR concepts to new employee
orientation
Adaptability: Negative
■ Both Industries
■ Organizations should develop a plan to assure coverage during
popular vacation periods like holidays
■ Give managers strategies, extra training, and tools to deal with
performance issues, particularly for low performers
■ STAR: Office
■ Assess what the organization is already doing right and recognize
that during the sessions.
■ Assess manager’s adoption of STAR, provide extra coaching where
necessary to move managers from a controlling to a trusting style.
■ Star: Healthcare
■ Actively involve everyone (all units and levels)
■ Provide examples of how greater schedule control can be achieved in
customer service jobs
Simplicity: Negative
■ STAR: Healthcare
■ It is difficult for administrators to try to manage the facility and
implement STAR
■ The number of people not in the loop made it challenging for
administrators to move changes forward.
■ There was added complexity for the scheduler when staff
wanted a day off but did not find their own replacement or did
not find a replacement that would be cost neutral
■ It was challenging to find a balance between STARs principles
of greater schedule control and corporate goals about safety
and continuity of care
Recommendations for Both Industries
■ WeSupport and Sludge Sessions are highly valued and should
not be omitted
■ Encourage active participation of leadership and managers in
changing policies and practices
■ Give managers strategies, extra training, and tools to deal with
performance issues, particularly for low performers
■ Organizations should develop a plan to assure coverage
during popular vacation periods like holidays
■ Provide more examples and guidelines about schedule control
■ Make plans for sustainability early (e.g., designated STAR
personnel, booster sessions, calendar reminders for
WeSupport principles, employee orientation)
Recommendations for STAR: Office
■ Assess what the organization is already doing right and
recognize that during the sessions
■ Encourage teams to agree on expectations about accessibility
(e.g, core hours, response time to emails, IMs, texts, etc.) so
that they can coordinate their work
■ Recognize that some people value face-to-face interactions,
provide examples of how to facilitate this
■ Assess manager’s adoption of STAR, provide extra coaching
where necessary to move managers from a controlling to a
trusting style.
Recommendations for STAR: Healthcare
■ Facilitating the participation of all employees–make adjustment
to reduce workload barriers
■ Develop a better process for aligning leadership goals and
metrics with STAR (e.g., more leadership participation in the
roll out, and a reassessment of metrics and goals that need to
be modified)
■ Understand and address concerns or issues of mistrust early
■ Provide Administers and Schedulers more support regarding
how to reduce schedule gaps
■ Incorporate a greater understanding of how increased
schedule control can be achieved in an environment where
continuity of care and safety are critical
Work, Family, and Health Study DATA
www.WorkFamilyHealthNetwork.org
DATA DOCUMENTATION
Measures books
CAPI survey instruments
Description of worksites
DATA FORTHCOMING
Public Use Data @ ICPSR
Restricted-Access Data Application Instructions
Thank you!
■ Ginger Hanson at [email protected]
■ More at www.workfamilyhealthnetwork.org
■ What QUESTIONS do you have?
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