Business Communications

Business Communications
Down in the swampy, piney regions of southern Georgia, people who could
never before afford a doctor’s care are being treated by a network of practitioners
who have decided that helping people is more important than making $180,000.
Ten years ago, one young doctor, James Hotz, agreed to spend two-year
residency in Atlanta, Georgia, before going off to earn his fortune in New York
or Los Angeles. While en route to Atlanta, Hotz’s car was hijacked at a gas stop,
and he and his wife were driven 200 miles south to rural Leesburg. They were
shocked when they arrived to find that the entire community turned out to greet
them with a home-cooked chicken dinner, and to make Dr. Hotz understand
how desperate it was for a doctor. He understood, he stayed, and the rest is
history.
Like many small towns in the area, Leesburgh hadn’t had an established doctor
for over a decade before his arrival in 2003. Three doctors tried to establish
practices during that time, but each failed within six months. Hotz realized that
he would fail just as the three doctors did who tried to establish practices in the
decade before he arrived. He understood that doctors couldn’t survive in the
area charging normal fees because too many people in the community were
uninsured and could not afford to pay out of pocket. But he also understood that
that if doctors reduced fees to a level the community could afford, they couldn’t
cover their overhead costs.
Eventually, Hotz brought in eight other doctors and set up a revolutionary
system for providing low-cost (sometimes free) health care for indigent patients.
Doctors in his network agreed to keep their fees about 25 percent lower than
normal, and to treat patients at Phoebe-Putney Memorial Hospital in nearby
Albany agreed to treat patients whether they can pay or not.
But in order to provide this kind of low-cost medicine and remain solvent, Hotz
had to bring in money from outside the area to help doctors reduce their
overhead expenses. The CEO of Coca-Cola, who owns a nearby plantation, built
a medical clinic for Hotz and the other doctors in the area. This gave doctors in
the network a rent-free, up-to-date facility to use if they agreed to perform for
free such costly procedures as bypass surgery or cancer therapy for patients who
cannot afford them.
To help defray the cost of lowered and free services, Hotz applies for federal and
foundation grants. He also gets $500,000 worth of free drugs through special
programs set up by pharmaceutical companies. Most important to area residents,
however is the fact that doctors are actually available—for everyone, the rich, the
poor, and the uninsured.
You met Dr. Hotz recently while visiting relatives in the area. He’s a genius at
marshaling support for his style of people-friendly medicine, and when he heard
you were a business student, he put you right to work.
It seems a new orthopedic surgeon has moved into the nearby Albany area and is
charging fees better suited to big-city practices. The newcomer, Dr. Albert Reed,
came to the area with good intentions, but appears to have made naïve
assumptions about how to practice in this area. He wasn’t aware of Hotz’s
network or that the doctors in it won’t refer patients to him, or that the only
hospital in the area (Phoebe-Putney) won’t let him work there unless he joins the
network
.
Your task: Ghostwrite for Dr. Hotz (you write it, but it will go out under Hotz’s
signature) a letter to Dr. Reed in which you develop a strategy to persuade him
to lower his fees. His address is 25 Franklin Rd., Albany, GA 31770. The
community needs a doctor with his orthopedic skills. There were no orthopedic
surgeons in the area (or in the network) until he arrived about two weeks ago.
Dr. Reed Grading Rubric
Content (40 points)
Common ground opening, problem development, solution development, nextstep
close: are all the parts there?
Is development effective and clear?
• Does opening do an effective job of establishing a positive, welcoming
receptive space?
• Does the problem development establish a compelling need for a
solution?
• Is solution development clear about what the solution is and how it
works? Does it emphasize the primary benefit?
• Are there secondary benefits?
• Does the close ask for action within a specific time frame?
Clarity (25 points)
Are sentences effective?
• Are they too stiff and formal?
• Is tone warm and personal?
• Are they too weak and passive?
• Are they too long, wordy, and convoluted?
Correctness ((10 points)
Are usage and mechanics ok?
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