Kylee Knighten

OGL 481 Pro-Seminar I:

PCA-Political Frame Worksheet
Worksheet Objectives:
1. Describe the political frame
2. Apply the political frame to your personal case situation

Complete the following making sure to support your ideas and cite from the textbook and other
course materials per APA guidelines. After the peer review, you have a chance to update this and
format for your Electronic Portfolio due in Module 6.

1) Briefly restate your situation from Module 1 and your role.

My title is Senior Recruiter and I have been in this role for the last 3 months. I joined Coast
Healthcare 8 months ago in May 2021. Initially I was welcomed into the company as a Recruiter
and after onboarding my 20th travel nurse I was awarded the title of Senior Recruiter. The title
comes with no additional responsibility, nor does is really hold any weight in the company. It’s a
small way of Coast acknowledging growth of new employees. The average recruiter takes over a
year to build their client base to 20 nurses and many recruiters have somewhere between 20-80
nurses at any given time. Since all contracts are temporary (usually 13-weeks) recruiters must
continue to prospect to build their desk. In the 8 months I have been here I have overcome
several challenges and am exceeding my current goal by 350% and supporting 30 nurses actively
working.

Due to the increased need of healthcare professionals across the country right now our
credentialing team is extremely overwhelmed and understaffed. Every hospital across the
country needs nurses, forcing Coast to quickly onboard and get nurses started. Because of the
influx Coast was not prepared to take on such a high demand and the executive team encouraged
recruiters to stop actively recruiting, while implementing the following policy “after nurses are
offered a position the credentialing specialist assigned to their job will not reach out until 1 week
before their start date”. This change in time from when the nurse is offered to 1 week prior to
their start date was setting our nurses up for failure. The drug screen and background check alone
could take up to 7 business days for results and having only 5 to complete all medical
requirements was impossible. Recruiters voiced their frustrations, and the executive team had no
other response but to delay the process to buy them time to catch up. Requesting that recruiters
stop enrolling nurses means they stop receiving commission. As you can imagine this was a
challenging situation that the company took a month to overcome.

2) Describe how the politics of the organization influenced the situation.

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 “The political view frames a different world. Organizations are coalitions composed of
individuals and groups with enduring differences who live in a world of scarce resources. That
puts power and conflict at the center of organizational decision making.” (Bolman & Deal,
2017). If we view this situation from the political frame perspective each department becomes
part of the coalition. The departments that are involved are Recruitment, Credentialing, Human
Resources, Account Management, Leadership, and the Support team. Each department has a
scarcity of resources because there is an abundance of demand with. No supply. Nurses are
plentiful during the pandemic they are all in search of the highest paying jobs at hospitals and
Coast Healthcare has a shortage of supporting resources to get the nurses jobs. So, while the jobs
are available, and nurses are as well battle between departments within the organization
continues to spiral.

The department that holds the power makes the final decision and that is our leadership team.
The politics here worked in favor for the credentialing department, since recruitment was not
longer onboarding nurses, credential was able to catch up on their workload. In the text Bolman
and Deal mention that “Organizational change and effectiveness depends on managers political
skills,” (Bolman & Deal, 2017). I do think the decision to slow recruitment was effective and a
political decision, but I don’t think they negotiated with other departments to solve the problem
at hand.

3) Recommend how you would use organizational politics for an alternative course of
action regarding your case.

We have learned that politics is about having an agenda and finding the means to get the
agenda accomplished. The text references several times the importance of negotiation and
encountering ethical obstacles along the way. Both factors were not taken into consideration
when the decision was made to halt recruiting of nurses. The overlying issue here is that
credentialing cannot keep up with the demand from recruitment. There is a direct correlation
between the number of nurses that we bring in and the need for each and every one of them to be
onboarded with their individual requirement’s pertaining to their hospitals.

If I was able to put the political frame into place, I would be sure to convey the agenda with
the entire company. Each department should be aware of the obstacles and what leadership
planned to do to tackle it. The agenda is a call to action and requires the participation across all
departments. The course of action taken should have been consulted with recruitment because we
were the most impacted by this change. “Negotiation occurs whenever two or more parties with
some interest in common and others in conflict need to reach agreement,” (Bolman & Deal,
2017). I think if a consultation would have happened the recruitment team would have had a
better understanding of the situation regardless of the decision that the powerful leadership team
chose to make or not.

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 4) Reflect on what you would do or not do differently given what you have learned about
this frame.

I now understand that politics are an inevitable part of every organization, but I think the
political frame is very aggressive and does not fit every situation. There is a lot of mention of
scare resources and while that did play a large role in why the workload was overbearing, the
communication is what was lacking and the political frame does not place an emphasis on
communication. They simply layout the problem and create and agenda surrounding it. While
there will always be a department with the final say at Coast Healthcare, proper communication
could have alleviated any tension between departments.

The only thing I would have done differently in this situation is reiterate the “why” behind the
final decisions. Your team will respect you if they trust you. There will always be members who
are overly cautious or skeptical but regardless if they have trust in the department with power (as
the political frame would have it) then they are more likely to be on board with the decisions
being made.

Reference or References

Bolman, L. G., & Deal, T. E. (2017). Reframing organizations: Artistry, choice, and

leadership (6th ed.). San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass