Transformational Leadership in Addressing Technology Resistance in Correctional Facilities

Transformational Leadership in Addressing Technology Resistance in Correctional Facilities

The Organizational Problem of Focus

A review of the Arizona Department of Corrections’ medical records systems highlights a common organizational problem that affects all correctional institutions in the United States: the cultural resistance and skepticism towards integrating advanced digital technologies within correctional settings. The Arizona Department of Corrections has been using basic technologies in major operations, especially in the management of the medical records of the incarcerated. However, it still has remained reluctant to adopt and integrate advanced technologies, especially AI, in managing medical and other information within its operations. This resistance and reluctance to adopt and utilize these advanced technologies in managing information within the department is evidently driven by a lack of trust in advanced technologies, low levels of digital literacy, and a lack of proper adoption and implementation frameworks.

Recent post-COVID-19 pandemic research and evidence, such as those presented by Montoya-Barthelemy et al. (2020), identify correctional facilities as a focal point for the current and future public health in the US due to the susceptibility of the populations within these settings. LeMasters and Brinkley-Rubinstein (2024), based on the exposure to the reality of prison health transparency brought about by the pandemic, argue that the poorly designed built environments create stressful and unpredictable living conditions that make it hard to provide quality and timely healthcare within correctional facilities. The United States is currently going through a phase of even worse mass incarceration with longer times served within correctional settings. Evidently, incarceration worsens people’s health. LeMasters and Brinkley-Rubinstein (2024) further state that due to the higher rates of spread of infectious diseases within prison settings than in the general population, correctional settings have the potential to become the epicenter for future public health crises. This creates the need to adopt and integrate advanced health data collection and management systems within correctional facilities that can capture critical data to quantify the status of prison health and improve health management within correctional services. However, challenges created by the resistance and reluctance to adopt and utilize these advanced technologies necessitate the adoption of a targeted leadership model to help address the underlying factors.

Selected Theory of Leadership

The cultural resistance and skepticism towards integrating advanced technologies to improve the current medical records systems at the Arizona Department of Corrections can be managed and overcome through the adoption of the transformational leadership theory. The leadership theory has four major components: idealized influence, inspirational motivation, intellectual stimulation, and individual consideration. The components of the transformational leadership theory align with the Scholar-Practitioner-Leader model in a number of ways.

Firstly, the Scholar-Practitioner-Leader model can be viewed as a support system that combines a leader’s knowledge, skills, and abilities to guide them on how to lead and influence others to be involved and contribute to personal and organizational development projects. As a transformational leader, the individual is expected to be knowledgeable and a visionary who understands the needs of the individual and the organization and utilizes their skills and abilities to personalize motivation. This aligns with the component of individualized consideration in which the leader must nurture growth at an individual level.

The component of idealized influence from the transformational leadership theory presents the leader as a role model whose values and actions can be copied by others to drive change. For the leader to achieve such influence, as per the perspectives of the Scholar-Practitioner-Leader model, they must become scholars focused on understanding the nature of resistance to adopting technology within correctional facilities, underlying factors, and other barriers.

The components of inspirational motivation and intellectual stimulation guide the transformational leader to ignite a desire for change and growth. Notably, the Scholar-Practitioner-Leader model can guide and support a transformational leader to overcome the challenges of cultural resistance and skepticism toward integrating advanced technologies in the corrections system. This is achievable through transforming the leader into a practitioner and an educator who can effectively communicate their vision for advanced technologies in medical records management while addressing the issues of deficits in digital literacy, security concerns, and other issues driving the skepticism over such technologies.

Capacity of the Transformational Leadership Theory to Mitigate the Organizational Problem

The transformational leadership theory provides a comprehensive framework that can guide the leadership within the Arizona Department of Corrections to address the issue of technology adoption reluctance within correctional facilities. The theory can guide the leadership to create and communicate a compelling vision that all members of the facility will need to be a part of. It also challenges individuals within the recreation department to see the bigger vision and opportunities with the adoption of advanced technologies in health information management. The theory further helps understand the organizational and individual user reasons for reluctance and resistance against the advanced technologies and personalize interventions to these reasons and needs. Additionally, the theory has been noted to help create an environment for knowledge sharing and challenging the status quo through innovation and creativity (Robbins & Davidhizar, 2020). Therefore, the transformational has the capacity to help mitigate the problem within the Arizona Department of Corrections by promoting innovativeness in medical records within the prison and jail system, guiding and empowering users, addressing concerns, and promoting learning through providing comprehensive user training on advanced technologies like AI.

 References

LeMasters, K., & Brinkley-Rubinstein, L. (2024). Covid-19 in US jails and prisons: implications for the next public health crisis. BMJ, 384, e076975. https://doi.org/10.1136/BMJ-2023-076975

Montoya-Barthelemy, A. G., Lee, C. D., Cundiff, D. R., & Smith, E. B. (2020). COVID-19 and the Correctional Environment: The American Prison as a Focal Point for Public Health. American Journal of Preventive Medicine, 58(6), 888–891. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.amepre.2020.04.001

Robbins, B., & Davidhizar, R. (2020). Transformational leadership in health care today. Health Care Manager, 39(3), 117–121. https://doi.org/10.1097/HCM.0000000000000296

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Review Box 1.1, “The Evolution of Leadership Definitions,” in Ch. 1 (pp. 24–27) of Leadership: Theory and Practice.

Identify a problem in your organization or industry that can be explored or improved through a 21st-century leadership theory**. You can use the problem you identified in your Week 1 assignment, or you can choose a different problem.

Transformational Leadership in Addressing Technology Resistance in Correctional Facilities

Write a 525- to 700-word (minimum) analysis that includes the following:

Describe the organizational problem.
Describe the theory of leadership selected in relationship to an organizational problem using the Scholar-Practitioner-Leader model as a guide.
Explain how the leadership theory might help mitigate the identified organizational problem.

Support all assertions with citations from peer-reviewed articles.

**Select a leadership theory from the options outlined in this document. Each theory includes a brief description. Note: This should not be used as a source of information for you to reference in your responses.

Use the APA Paper Template for your submission.

Reminders:

Note: A well-structured scholarly paragraph contains 3–5 sentences. Please refer to the MEAL Plan as a guide. Avoid the use of first-person language. You will be writing this analysis from a third-person perspective.

Consider the following: How will you organize your writing? What specific topics might be appropriate? Use the 7th Edition APA Example template and appropriate level headings (subheadings) to help organize your assessment based on your specific topics.

Format your analysis according to current APA guidelines. Refer to the 7th Edition APA Example template as a guide to ensure the assessment meets APA standards.