Skip navigation

Walk the talk: Leaders' enacted priority of safety, incident reporting, and error management

Walk the talk: Leaders' enacted priority of safety, incident reporting, and error management

Van Dyck, Cathy, Dimitrova, Nicoletta ORCID: 0000-0001-9147-7987, De Korne, Dirk F. and Hiddema, Frans (2013) Walk the talk: Leaders' enacted priority of safety, incident reporting, and error management. In: Simons, Tony, Leroy, Hannes and Savage, Grant T., (eds.) Leading in health care organizations: Improving safety, satisfaction and financial performance. Advances in Health Care Management Series, 14 . Emerald Group Publishing Limited, pp. 95-117. ISBN 978-1781906330

Full text not available from this repository.

Abstract

Purpose – The main goal of the current research was to investigate whether and how leaders in health care organizations can stimulate incident reporting and error management by ‘‘walking the safety talk’’ (enacted priority of safety).

Design/methodology/approach – Open interviews (N=26) and a crosssectional questionnaire (N=183) were conducted at the Rotterdam Eye Hospital (REH) in The Netherlands.

Findings – As hypothesized, leaders’ enacted priority of safety was positively related to incident reporting and error management, and the relation between leaders’ enacted priority of safety and error management was mediated by incident reporting. The interviews yielded rich data on (near) incidents, the leaders’ role in (non)reporting, and error management, grounding quantitative findings in concrete case descriptions.

Research implications – We support previous theorizing by providing empirical evidence showing that (1) enacted priority of safety has a stronger relationship with incident reporting than espoused priority of safety and (2) the previously implied positive link between incident reporting and error management indeed exists. Moreover, our findings extend our understanding of behavioral integrity for safety and the mechanisms through which it operates in medical settings.

Practical implications – Our findings indicate that for the promotion of incident reporting and error management, active reinforcement of priority of safety by leaders is crucial.

Value/originality – Social sciences researchers, health care researchers and health care practitioners can utilize the findings of the current paper in order to help leaders create health care systems characterized by higher incident reporting and more constructive error handling.

Item Type: Book Section
Uncontrolled Keywords: Patient safety; leadership; espoused and enacted priority of safety; incident reporting; error management
Faculty / School / Research Centre / Research Group: Faculty of Business
Faculty of Business > Department of Human Resources & Organisational Behaviour
Last Modified: 19 Jan 2018 12:03
URI: http://gala.gre.ac.uk/id/eprint/18571

Actions (login required)

View Item View Item