ABSTRACT
The focus may be on medical error caused by individuals, but equally important are management errors. The causal source may be managerial errors created by those who supervise and are responsible for a limited number of subordinates. The effect of an error may be limited to a small group. The causal source could be an organizational error affecting an entire enterprise, hospital, company, or entity. It could be an institutional error affecting an entire professional discipline, a group of affiliated hospitals, a joint venture, a group of partnerships, a merged company with subsidiaries, or a trade group with common viewpoints (see the management chapters in Peters and Peters 2006b). Management errors are more difficult to investigate and remedy since a command-and-control hierarchy has the inherent authority to resist examinations of its decisions and actions, may maintain formal business and social distance, and may not permit perceived challenges in any form or manner. This merely suggests that different tactics, content, and negotiation skills are needed to reduce management error.
