Innovation to Transform Healthcare: The Massachusetts General Hospital Experience
On Wednesday, May 18, health care professionals, business leaders, students and public servants gathered to attend an event organized by the Telfer Health Transformation Exchange (THTex), featuring Dr. Eric Isselbacher, Director of the Healthcare Transformation Lab at the Massachusetts General Hospital and Associate Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School.
Dr. Isselbacher described the activities and role of the Healthcare Transformation Lab. Interestingly, he said that the biggest challenge for the Lab is to bring a culture of innovation to a very successful organization (the Massachusetts General Hospital is consistently ranked as a top hospital in the United States).
During his talk, Dr. Isselbacher stated that “innovation is set to fail” because of the nature of disruption it has the potential to unleash. With that in mind, his team focuses on each potential failure point and engages to transform potential failure into success.
Finally, Dr. Isselbacher observed that a culture of innovation is firmly established in hospitals: “Innovation is a concept that is valued institutionally”, he says. His team is expanding the scope of its activities to more and more hospital departments.
After Dr. Isselbacher’s presentation, the audience engaged in a lively discussion centered on healthcare transformation, innovation strategies and a comparison between the American and Canadian healthcare systems.
Another success: The Telfer Annual Conference on Accounting and Finance
For a second year, The Telfer Annual Conference on Accounting and Finance was once again a resounding success, with engaging presentations and discussions covering several timely topics in the fields of accounting and finance. More than 130 participants from around the world attended the event, hosted on May 13, 2016 in the Desmarais Building.
The conference’s program featured 27 presentations, including eight parallel sessions and two distinguished keynote speakers. Jay Ritter, Joseph B. Cordell Eminent Scholar Chair, University of Florida, discussed issues related to external financing. Jeffrey Callen, Joseph L. Rotman Chair in Accounting, University of Toronto, proposed a new approach for computing cost of equity capital.
This event was supported by the Father Edgar Thivierge Chair in Business History, the CPA Canada Accounting, the Research Office of the Telfer School of Management, and the Finance Research and Learning lab.
A special thank you goes to the organizing committee and in particular to the lead organizers, Professor Lamia Chourou and Professor Cheryl McWatters, Father Edgar Thivierge Chair in Business History, as well as Professor Samir Saadi. We look forward to next year’s event!
Body language is a lot more than “power postures” and firm handshakes
Nonverbal communication is often a hot topic in the popular management press, but management scholars lag behind in exploring this important form of communication. A deeper understanding of non-verbal behaviour in organizations would help researchers develop evidence-based tools, which managers can use to address a host of workplace challenges, argue Silvia Bonaccio, Jane O’Reilly, Sharon O’Sullivan, and François Chiocchio of the Telfer School. An article they published in the Journal of Management, entitled "Nonverbal Behavior and Communication in the Workplace: A Review and an Agenda for Research", is intended as a guide for academic researchers, but is also potentially of interest to anyone wanting to navigate what we know about nonverbal behaviour.
Producing meaning across nearly every aspect of organizational life, nonverbal behaviour by one researcher’s estimate fuels between 65% and 93% of all human interaction. The American anthropologist-linguist Edward Sapir called nonverbal communication “an elaborate secret code that is written nowhere, known by none, and used by all.” Even the extent to which people use nonverbal behaviors intentionally or strategically is an open question. While leaders are coached on mastering body language, a significant part of communication from non-verbal cues is likely beyond anyone’s control.
The authors call for research that identifies how tacit notions about emotional expression contribute to (or impede) accurate attributions. Training programs could then be designed to enhance individuals’ tacit understanding of nonverbal behaviour broadly, rather than focusing on explicit nonverbal behaviours. This idea has implications for both personnel selection and performance appraisal.
Another promising area is mitigating interpersonal conflict and discrimination. It would be valuable to better understand the role of nonverbal behaviour in this, and also to use this knowledge to improve training programs focused on civility and respect in the workplace, according to the article.
A third area is to enhance leaders’ nonverbal communication across cultures and contexts. Because people have different expectations about the use of various nonverbal cues when communicating, a better recognition of these differences will have implications in terms of developing charismatic leaders – and how followers respond to them.
These are just a few reasons why organizational scholars should be encouraged to develop a deeper understanding of how nonverbal behavior influences the social world of organizations, the researchers write.
Canada and India Business and Education Collaboration
On Saturday, May 7, 2016, the Telfer School of Management Research Office, in collaboration with the Office of the International Research, hosted a breakfast meeting between the Shastri Indo-Canadian Institute (SICI) and the University of Ottawa to discuss collaborative research and educational opportunities between India and Canada.
Guest speakers for this event included:
- Suchorita Chattopadhyay, Vice-President, Shastri Indo-Canadian Institute and Professor, Department of Comparative Literature, Jadavpur University
- Peter MacArthur, Director General, South and Southeast Asia and Oceania Bureau, Global Affairs Canada
- Sukhwant Nannar, Chair, Indo-Canada Ottawa Business Chamber (ICOBC)
The speakers brought light on various topics including research opportunities between Canada and India, tactics to work more closely with international students and with India as a strategic partner. Dr. Chattopadhyay discussed the opportunities for closer ties between Indian and Canadian academics, as well as relevant challenges. Mr. MacArthur highlighted various initiatives undertaken by the Canadian government to establish a stronger bond between Canada and India. Finally, Dr. Nannar focused on the potential role that ICOBC could play in fostering educational collaboration between Canadian and Indian institutions.
Business schools’ research impact in the National Capital Region
On May 3, 2016, the Telfer School of Management hosted the “Research in Management Forum: National Capital Region”, a joint event of the Telfer School of Management, the Sprott School of Business and the Université du Québec en Outaouais.
Michael Fung-Kee-Fung, Chief Cancer Transformation and Strategy Professor and Head of Surgical Oncology at the Ottawa Hospital, presented a keynote address on health transformation opportunities for business schools.
The event featured an elevator pitch competition by select graduate students from all three schools, in which they had 7 minutes to pitch their current research.
We would like to congratulate the winners:
1st place: Robert Helal, PhD in Management, Carleton University
Runner-ups: Jeff Jackson, PhD in Management, Carleton University
Lily Murariu, PhD in Project Management, Université du Québec en Outaouais
The winning team of the 2016 National Capital Management Research Fund was announced; the recipients are Stéphane Gagnon (UQO), Gregory Richards (Telfer School) and Alejandro Ramirez (Sprott). The title of their forthcoming project is “Enabling the Agile Organization: Toward an Integrated Capability Model for Intelligent Applications Projects”.
The event was followed by a panel discussion on how to improve the impact of the research of business schools in the National Capital Region. This panel, moderated by Bruce Lazenby, President and CEO of Invest Ottawa, brought forward some interesting points on research collaboration and knowledge dissemination.
