New book offers management lessons to public health professionals
May 5, 2009
In 1983 Ken Blanchard captured the business world’s attention with a small book called The One-Minute Manager.
A new book from the North Carolina Institute for Public Health, Managing the Public Health Enterprise, promises similar to-the-point lessons for public health managers and others in related professions. The Institute is part of the Gillings School of Global Public Health at the University of North Carolina.
Many of the book’s chapters first appeared as columns in the popular “Management Moment” series in the Journal of Public Health Management and Practice;others were written specifically for this volume. It covers topics like how to be an effective coach to maximize team performance, the essentials of effective partnerships, how to create and sustain successful public health initiatives using business skills, and how to run meetings, manage electronic correspondence, and even how to manage your boss.
Journal editor Dr. Lloyd F. Novick of the Department of Public Health, Brody School of Medicine at East Carolina University, says, “The Management Moment column has been immensely popular with our readers from across the spectrum of public health practice. Having a book with the columns organized around commonly encountered themes makes this a highly useful reference for public health professionals interested in demonstrating leadership and improving management within their organizations.”
Dr. Ed Baker, director of NCIPH, Dr. Anne Menkens, program director with NCIPH, and Dr. Janet Porter, COO of the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, collaborated on the project and wrote most of the chapters. Other authors include public health, health care, business, and fundraising professionals and educators from UNC and the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute.
The book will fill an important niche by providing useful information to managers at all levels of public health practice. Dr. Bill Roper, CEO of UNC Healthcare Systems and dean of the UNC School of Medicine says in the foreword, “Today’s public health manager must keep both big picture and the details in mind to envision new projects and run longstanding ones. While looking out for the next SARS or avian flu outbreak, the next hurricane, or terrorist attack, while testing well water and immunizing babies, the public health manager must balance budgets, hire personnel, run meetings, communicate with staff and partners, learn to use new technology, and find funding, all within the context of turbulent economic times, new and re-emerging health and safety threats, and a growing burden of chronic disease. Managing the Public Health Enterprise contains concrete advice for these management challenges.”
Practicality is the authors’ goal. Baker says, “This is a practical guide. We want new managers to use it as a resource when a problem arises—’I wonder what Managing the Public Health Enterprise says about this?’”
For the experienced manager, the book is designed as a refresher for managing people, partnerships, communication, and business.
Managing the Public Health Enterprise may be ordered through the Jones and Bartlett Publishers website at www.jbpub.com or by phone at 800-832-0034.
About Jones and Bartlett Publishers, LLC
Jones and Bartlett, an independent publisher headquartered in Sudbury, Massachusetts, publishes text, professional, and reference books and a variety of multimedia and online products. Jones and Bartlett is widely recognized in the fields of medicine, nursing, life sciences, physical sciences, health education, allied health, emergency care, emergency medical services, fire science, criminal justice, mathematics, and computer science.
You can email the authors at thepublichealthenterprise@unc.edu.