| Course | PNP 6003 Leading and Managing Public and Nonprofit Organizations |
|---|---|
| Module | Module 5 |
| Paper type | Leadership action plan |
| Length | 1,230 words, about 4 pages plus title and reference pages |
| Format | APA 7 student paper |
| School | American College of Education |
| Program | Doctor of Business Administration |
| Updated | October 2026 |
Free sample paper for PNP 6003 Module 5
Twelve Months to Prove It: A Leadership Action Plan for Turning a Free Clinic's Strategy Into Results
Student Name
American College of Education
PNP6003: Leading and Managing Public and Nonprofit Organizations
Module 5 Assignment
Instructor Name
November 9, 2026
Introduction
Over this course I profiled the Spokane free clinic, built a logic model and strategic plan, set measures and used them to decide how to spend a grant, and analyzed a funder's offer that tests the mission. An action plan is where intentions meet calendars. This paper sets out what will be done in the next twelve months, by whom and by when, how each action will be judged and what could derail it. It also explains which challenges require leadership in the sense of changing how people think and work, as distinct from managing tasks, and closes with my own development as a leader.
Five Priorities for the Year
The strategic plan has three goals over three years. In the first year, five actions carry most of the weight. First, extend the chronic disease registry from the pilot team to the whole clinic. Second, hire and support the community health worker funded by the foundation grant. Third, conclude the negotiation with the hospital funder on terms that protect access and privacy. Fourth, strengthen the board's financial and data expertise. Fifth, launch a monthly giving program to begin reducing dependence on the three largest funders. Each serves at least one strategic goal, and together they are as much as an organization of eleven staff can carry alongside daily operations.
The Action Plan
Registry rollout. Owner: operations director with the nurse practitioner. Months 1 to 3. Measure: share of chronic disease visits with blood pressure or A1C recorded, target 95% by month 3. Risk: added time at visits; response: medical assistants enter readings during intake rather than clinicians after visits.
Community health worker. Owner: executive director for hiring, operations director for supervision. Hired by month 2. Measures: chronic care no-show rate, target 18% by month 12, and hypertension control, target 58%. Risk: the role drifts into general front-desk help; response: a written role description and weekly review of the outreach log.
Hospital negotiation. Owner: executive director with the board chair. Proposal by month 2, agreement or decision by month 4. Measure: agreement on shared slots, aggregate reporting and dual measures. Risk: refusal; response: the two-year replacement plan approved by the board in advance.
Board development. Owner: board chair and governance committee. Two new members with finance or data backgrounds recruited by month 9. Measure: skills matrix gaps closed. Risk: long recruitment; response: begin with advisory roles that can convert to board seats.
Monthly giving. Owner: development coordinator. Launch by month 4. Measure: 150 monthly donors by month 12. Risk: competing with the annual gala for the same donors; response: invite gala donors to convert part of their gift into monthly support.
Technical and Adaptive Challenges
Not all of these actions are the same kind of work. Heifetz et al. (2009) separated technical problems, which current know-how can fix, from adaptive challenges, where progress depends on people letting go of familiar values, habits or loyalties. Installing a registry and hiring a community health worker are mostly technical. The adaptive work lies elsewhere. Volunteers who have served the clinic for years may experience outcome measurement as distrust of their care. The board, proud of a mission statement written by founders, may resist revising it. And staff accustomed to counting visits as success must learn to see a missed appointment as the clinic's problem, not only the patient's. These shifts cannot be ordered; they have to be led, through conversation, patience and visible attention to what people fear losing.
Leading the Adaptive Work
Three practices will guide that work. I will share the registry's first results with volunteers in person, framing them as a picture of how patients are doing rather than a grade on anyone's care, and I will ask them what the numbers miss. I will bring the mission revision to the board as a question about the patients the clinic now serves, using the profile's data, and let board members draft the final wording. And I will build the no-show rate into the weekly team huddle so that staff see it fall as outreach takes hold. Each practice treats the people affected as partners in the change rather than recipients of it.
Review Rhythm
Plans fade without a routine for checking them. Following the shift from periodic planning to ongoing strategic management that Poister (2010) described, the clinic will review the action plan on three cycles. Staff will review the registry, no-show and turned-away measures weekly in the huddle. The leadership team will review all five actions monthly against their dates and measures. The board will review a one-page dashboard quarterly and decide whether any action needs more resources or a new direction. Measures will be used for learning as well as reporting (Behn, 2003), which means discussing what the numbers suggest, not only whether targets were met.
Resources the Plan Requires
The plan asks for little new money beyond what is already committed. The community health worker is funded by the foundation grant for its first year. The registry tool costs about $3,000 a year and comes from the operating budget. Board recruitment and the monthly giving program require staff time rather than cash, roughly four hours a week from the development coordinator and two from me. The largest hidden cost is attention: every hour spent on the plan is an hour not spent on daily operations, so the executive director and I have agreed to defer two lower-priority projects, a website redesign and a volunteer handbook update, until the second year.
What Success Looks Like
At the end of twelve months, success would mean that every chronic disease visit records a measure of control, that the no-show rate has fallen toward 18% and hypertension control has risen toward 58%, that the hospital relationship rests on terms the clinic chose, that the board includes members who can read financial and outcome data closely and that 150 monthly donors provide a small but growing base of unrestricted support. Partial success would still be informative: if attendance improves but control does not, the clinic will know to look next at medication access or clinical protocols.
My Development as a Leader
This course changed how I see my role. I came to it as an operations director who measured success by whether the clinic opened on time and stayed within budget. The work of profiling, planning and measuring showed me how much of the clinic's future depends on choices no one had framed as choices, such as what to count and which funding conditions to accept. My development goals for the year are to present data to volunteers and the board in ways that invite discussion rather than defensiveness, to lead the hospital negotiation alongside the executive director rather than supporting it from behind and to complete a nonprofit financial management course before the next budget cycle.
Conclusion
The action plan turns the course's analysis into five actions with owners, dates, measures and risks. It separates technical tasks from the adaptive work of changing how volunteers, staff and the board think about results, and it sets a weekly, monthly and quarterly rhythm of review. If it succeeds, the clinic's good intentions will be backed by evidence that its patients are healthier, which is the standard ACE's course description sets for public and nonprofit leadership.
References
Behn, R. D. (2003). Why measure performance? Different purposes require different measures. Public Administration Review, 63(5), 586-606. https://doi.org/10.1111/1540-6210.00322
Heifetz, R., Grashow, A., & Linsky, M. (2009). The practice of adaptive leadership: Tools and tactics for changing your organization and the world. Harvard Business Press.
Poister, T. H. (2010). The future of strategic planning in the public sector: Linking strategic management and performance. Public Administration Review, 70(s1), s246-s254. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1540-6210.2010.02284.x
The PNP 6003 Module 5 assignment instructions
The closing module of PNP 6003 typically asks you to turn the analysis from earlier modules into a plan someone could carry out. Expect to choose a small number of priorities, assign responsibility and timelines, define how success will be measured and identify risks with responses. Many prompts also ask how you will lead the change, not only manage it, and what you will do to develop as a leader. Match the plan's ambition to the staff and money actually available. Tie every action back to the mission and strategic goals, and set a routine for reviewing progress so the plan does not end up forgotten. A one-page summary helps a board.
How this PNP 6003 Module 5 example is built
After recalling the course's earlier work, the paper names five first-year priorities and why they fit an eleven-person staff. The action plan gives each priority an owner, timeline, measure with target and a risk with a planned response. A section then distinguishes technical tasks from adaptive challenges, such as volunteers who may hear measurement as distrust, and three practices describe how the leader will handle them. A review rhythm sets weekly, monthly and quarterly checks, a section describes what success and partial success would look like and a personal development section names three goals before a short conclusion. Targets are carried forward from Module 3.
PNP 6003 Module 5 rubric: what full marks look like
Action plans are graded on specificity, feasibility and leadership insight. Faculty look for priorities that follow from earlier analysis, actions with clear owners, deadlines and measures and risks identified with responses. Plans that address how people will be brought along, not just what tasks will be done, score higher, as do those with a realistic review routine. Personal development goals should be concrete and connected to the plan. Plans that are too ambitious for the organization or vague about responsibility lose points. Writing quality and APA 7 formatting count here as in earlier modules. Plans that show how the leader will bring volunteers or staff along tend to rank highest.
PNP 6003 Module 5 help: mistakes that cost points
Action plans often fall apart on the details: who owns each step, when it is due and how anyone will know it worked. If your plan reads like a list of hopes, or your instructor has asked how you will lead the change, our writers can help you build a plan with owners, dates, measures and risks. Pass along your earlier module work, a sense of your organization's capacity and the prompt; the action plan you get back comes with a review rhythm and leadership practices suited to your setting. Clinics, health departments, schools and nonprofits all benefit. A specific plan is the clearest evidence that analysis has become leadership. Owners and dates are filled in.
Write yours, or have the desk draft it
This paper is an original model document written by our desk, not a submitted student paper and not an official American College of Education document. Read it for the moves, then write your own to the instructions in your classroom. If you want one built to your exact prompt and rubric, the first custom sample is free and arrives in 24 to 48 hours.
More PNP 6003 and Doctor of Business Administration sample papers
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- PNP 6003 Module 2: Logic Model and Strategic Plan
- PNP 6003 Module 3: Performance Measures and Decision
- PNP 6003 Module 4: Leadership Dilemma Analysis
- PNP 6023 Module 3: Board Orientation Plan
- PNP 6013 Module 3: Collaboration Analysis
- PNP 6023 Module 1: Board Roles and Responsibilities
- LEAD 6503 Module 4: Evaluation and Sustainability
PNP 6003 Module 5 questions, answered
What does PNP6003 Module 5 usually ask for?
PNP6003 usually ends with a leadership action plan, turning your earlier analysis into specific actions, responsibilities, timelines, measures and risks.
What should every action in an action plan include?
An owner, a deadline, a measure of success and a risk with a planned response, so progress can be checked and problems caught early.
What is the difference between technical and adaptive challenges?
A technical problem yields to know-how the organization already has; an adaptive one asks people to give up familiar habits, beliefs or expectations, so it has to be led rather than instructed.
Where can I find a free PNP 6003 Module 5 sample paper?
This page carries a complete one: a twelve-month action plan for a free clinic with five actions, each with an owner, date, measure and risk, plus the leader's development goals.
Should an action plan include personal leadership goals?
Many prompts ask for them. Tie them to the plan, such as skills you need to lead a negotiation or present data, and make them specific enough to check.