Developing an organizational change process model and online toolkit to assist public health professionals with evidence-informed decision making

Session: 

Oral session: Knowledge translation and communicating evidence (5)

Date: 

Monday 17 September 2018 - 12:00 to 12:10

Location: 

Carrick 2

All authors in correct order:

Dobbins M1, Marquez O1
1 National Collaborating Centre for Methods and Tools/McMaster University, Canada
Presenting author and contact person

Presenting author:

Maureen Dobbins

Contact person:

Maureen Dobbins
Abstract text
Background:
Public health is continuously undergoing organizational change in response to various drivers for change. A need exists for a public-health relevant approach to organizational change that includes easily accessible methods and tools for professionals.

Objectives:
1) To create an online organizational change tool kit based on a public health relevant process model; and
2) to include the most useful resources to support professionals through each stage of the change process.

Methods:
In order to understand the organizational change literature better, a scoping review was conducted for articles published between 2000 and 2015. Included articles were screened for process models and a snowball method was used to find additional models. A working group extracted relevant and key themes, facilitating creation of a new organizational change process model. Sub-searches within the original review results were conducted to populate the toolkit with useful methods and tools.

Results:
The review yielded 74,792 search results with 45 reviews included in the final review. The working group assessed 12 organizational change process models extracted from the review and 13 from the snowball method. A new five-stage organizational change cyclical model was created, beginning with:
1) a review of the NEED for change;
2) creating a PLAN for change;
3) IMPLEMENTing the change initiative;
4) INSTITUTIONalizing the change into the organization; and
5) EVOLUTION of the change initiative to ensure dynamic needs are met.
Relevant and useful methods and tools to complement each of the five stages of the model are being screened for relevance to populate the organizational change toolkit before publishing online.

Conclusions:
The five-stage organizational change model and tool kit aims to guide professionals through the change process and make it easier to select the most useful resources. The tool kit will facilitate public health’s need to continue to evolve effectively to various drivers of change and undergo necessary organizational change to use evidence in decision making.

Patient or healthcare consumer involvement:
This tool kit will meet the expressed need from Canadian public-health professionals regarding the overwhelming amount of organizational change literature and challenges in selecting useful resources driven by evidence.

Relevance to patients and consumers: 

Being able to successfully undergo an organizational change initiative is critical for any public health system to effectively respond to evolving needs of the public. Providing concrete guidance and useful, evidence-driven resources to support professionals through a change initiative that supports evidence-informed decision making ensures the most effective programs and services will be implemented into practice, leading to optimal population health outcomes. An easily accessible, online resource for professionals will save time associated with searching best available resources and reduce costs associated with failed change initiatives.