Cherie Gaither

Internal Communications and the Effect on Employee Engagement Cherie Gaither

Communication gaps can be devastating for any business in today's competitive and fast paced environment. In the hospital setting, it can literally be a matter of life or death. The purpose of the project was to develop and evaluate the effect of three evidence-based internal communication practices on employee engagement for pediatric hospital in Louisville, KY. This was the first known systematic investigation of communication strategies in a hospital setting. The evidence based practices include: Interactive Employee Forums, Wednesday Weekly newsletter and a Communication Portal page. After one year of this practice change, the following questions were asked and evaluated: Will internal communication practices have a significant impact on this hospital employee engagement? As compared to peer institutions within this multi-hospital organization, will this pediatric hospital have a greater increase in mean engagement scores, as a result of these practices? The result were not statistically significant, however some ceiling effect was observed. The pediatric hospital did increase percentage of engaged by 3%, the highest improvement of all five hospitals within the system.