Reference no: EM133304364
Assignment: You are the very newly appointed program manager of the School Health Program at a public health department. This program employs a team of 20 school nurses who visit local elementary and secondary schools to implement various health promotion strategies for students.
Under the previous manager, there had been an attempt by the senior leadership to entirely dismantle the School Health program. They believed that there was little value to having nurses in schools and decided to redeploy the nurses to work in other roles and programs within the public health dept. The plan was to accomplish this over the course of months. This was met with immense rebellion by the nurses. They were devasted, demoralized, angry, and distrustful.
Due to an overwhelming outcry by schools and community stakeholders opposing the removal of nurses from schools, the senior leaders reversed their decision and decided to keep the School Health program running.
Now, the nurses are returning to work after a summer layoff and are meeting you for the first time as their new manager. They are still demoralized and distrustful.
Question: Using evidence from the textbook, the lecture material, and reputable scholarly online sources, answer the following questions.
1. What strategies must you implement to build their trust in you as their new leader?
2. How would you approach empowering the nurses to believe in a new and better School Health program?