VHC COVID-19 study awarded once again
Rachel Gifford, Daan Westra, Frank van de Baan and Dirk Ruwaard have once again received recognition for their study on hospitals’ adaptations to the Covid-crisis. This year, the team won the ‘Best International Paper Award’ from the Healthcare Management division at the Academy of Management and the ‘Best ECR Paper award’ from the Society for Studies in Organizing Health Care. This constitutes the second year in a row that the team was awarded for their work. Last year they also won two awards from the Academy of Management with their work.
Last year, the team received two awards for their paper ‘To Uncertainty and Beyond: Cataloguing Hospitals’ Adaptations during the COVID-19 pandemic’, in which they study the dynamic capabilities of hospitals. This year, the team won their awards with two separate papers. During the 82nd edition of the Academy of Management annual meeting in Seattle last August, Rachel, Daan, Frank and Dirk received the ‘Best International Paper Award’ for their paper ‘Through the looking glass: Healthcare management’s biggest challenges in the wake of crisis’. In the paper, they describe the fundamental challenges that the Covid-crisis has revealed about managing healthcare organizations and indicate possible ways for healthcare management scholars to help in addressing these challenges. They became the first team to win this award in back to back years. Last week, the team also received the best paper (first-)authored by an Early Career Research (ECR) at the 13th edition of the Organizational Behaviour in Health Care conference in Birmingham, UK. They received the award for their paper ‘The reality of essentiality: What turbulent times reveal about the necessity and value of essential work’, in which they study what the crisis teaches us about the value of and appreciation for essential healthcare workers such as nurses.
Both papers were co-authored by Bram Fleuren from the Faculty of Psychology and Neuroscience (FPN) and stem from their project funded by the ZonMw Covid-19 research program. In this multi-faculty project, in which FPN’s Lieze Poesen and Fred Zijlstra also participate, they studied the adaptations of hospitals in Limburg to the Covid-crisis and the consequences for the sustainable employability of employees.
