Compare two organizational readiness tools

Sample Answer

Organizational readiness is a critical component of successful change in health practice. Readiness implies being motivated and capacitated to support health interventions (Dearing, 2018). At the organizational level, stakeholders and leaders should be adequately aware of the change and support it in all dimensions. However, change proponents should first assess the organization’s readiness to determine whether the proposed health interventions will succeed.

They can use different change readiness assessment tools depending on the organization’s type, proposed interventions, and situations. One widely applied readiness assessment tool is the organizational readiness to change assessment tool. Also described as the Organizational Resource and Context Assessment (ORCA), the tool assesses the organization’s readiness in terms of evidence, context, and facilitation (Kononowech et al., 2021). In this case, the proposed change should have adequate support from evidence-based literature, and the organization should have a suitable climate and adequate capacity to support change.

The other appropriate tool for organizational readiness is the Organizational Readiness for Knowledge Translation (OR4KT) tool. The tool assesses organization in six dimensions climate, content, leadership, change content, support, and motivation (Gagnon et al., 2019). Evaluating these components can accurately determine the organizational readiness for knowledge translation (implementing evidence-informed knowledge). After evaluating the available tools and their components, the most appropriate tool for assessing my organization is the ORCA tool.

Besides the quality of evidence, the ORCA tool focuses on the organization’s context to support change and its ability to help people change their attitudes. The tool follows the premise that people must change their ways of thinking and behaviors to be ready for change (Kononowech et al., 2021). The tool is also easy to use in readiness assessment. Importantly, it helps identify change barriers and facilitators before recommending a particular health intervention to improve health outcomes.

References

• Dearing, J. W. (2018). Organizational readiness tools for global health intervention A review. Frontiers in Public Health, 6, 56. https //doi.org/10.3389/fpubh.2018.00056
• Gagnon, M. P., Attieh, R., Dunn, S., Grandes, G., Bully, P., Estabrooks, C. A., … & Ouimet, M. (2019). Future directions for the organizational readiness for knowledge translation (OR4KT) tool response to recent commentaries. International Journal of Health Policy and Management, 8(5), 315-316. https //doi.org/10.15171%2Fijhpm.2019.03
• Kononowech, J., Hagedorn, H., Hall, C., Helfrich, C. D., Lambert-Kerzner, A. C., Miller, S. C., … & Damschroder, L. (2021). Mapping the organizational readiness to change assessment to the Consolidated Framework for Implementation Research. Implementation Science Communications, 2(1), 1-6. https //doi.org/10.1186/s43058-021-00121-0