HIM 520 is SNHU’s Leading as a HIM Professional course. It centers on leadership in health information management: leadership styles and their effects, recruiting and retaining staff, job design and remote work, performance appraisal and improvement plans, training and development, psychological safety, ethics and the integrity of the record, process improvement and work design and writing and revising department policies. Every module below opens a full sample paper or takes a free request for one; searches like "him 520 module 3", "HIM520 sample paper" and "HIM 520 milestone example" land on this page.
What HIM 520 is really about
HIM 520 is the leadership course in SNHU's MS Health Information Management, and its rubrics reward leadership decisions grounded in evidence about people. Graders look for leadership concepts applied to specific situations, human resource actions that are fair and lawful, feedback and training designed around what research shows works, ethical reasoning that protects the record and policies written clearly enough to guide staff.
The author of every sample here is a composite health information director at Sycamore Bend Health, a three-hospital system in central Tennessee that acquired its third hospital last year. The director now leads 132 staff whose departments had different cultures, pay scales and procedures, with coding turnover at 21%, release of information handled separately at each hospital and a remote work policy written before most coders went home. The director and health system are illustrative.
What HIM 520’s modules ask for
Across ten modules, HIM 520 typically asks for discussions of leadership and a closing reflection, short papers on human resource management, performance appraisal, an ethics case and policy revision, and a final project built in milestones: a leadership assessment of the department, a training and development plan, a work design and process improvement plan and the complete leadership plan.
Where students lose points in HIM 520
The most common HIM 520 deduction is leadership writing that stays abstract, praising a style without showing what the leader will do on Monday. The second is human resource advice that ignores fairness or law, such as disciplining an employee without documented expectations. Graders also mark down training plans with no needs analysis or evaluation, ethics papers that skip the record-integrity rules at stake and policies with no owner or review date. The fix is to apply each concept to a named situation and a specific action.
The HIM 520 drawers
HIM 520 Module 1 Discussion example
In the first week, a composite health information director leading three merged hospital departments, comparing the transactional style one former manager used with the relational style of another and deciding what the merged team needs, with Judge and Piccolo on transformational and transactional leadership, Cummings and colleagues on relational leadership in health care teams and Edmondson on psychological safety. Full sample paper, read it free.
HIM 520 Module 2 Human Resources Short Paper example
A graduate human resources paper for a merged three-hospital HIM department losing 21% of its coders a year: why people leave, what exit interviews show, harmonizing three pay scales fairly, rewriting job descriptions and hiring by competency with a coding test, wage and hour rules for nonexempt coders, a career ladder and remote work practices that keep people connected, drawing on Hom, Bloom and Humphrey and colleagues. Full sample paper, read it free.
HIM 520 Module 3 Final Project Milestone One example
The first final project milestone assesses what leadership a merged three-hospital HIM department needs: its structure and three inherited cultures, an engagement survey that splits sharply by site, listening sessions with 38 staff, stakeholders outside the department, four leadership challenges from trust to divergent procedures and the priorities for the plan, drawing on Cummings, Edmondson, Harrison and Hom and colleagues. Full sample paper, read it free.
HIM 520 Module 4 Performance Appraisal Short Paper example
A graduate performance management case: a respected coder's accuracy falls from 96% to 88% in six months after the merger and a move to remote work. The paper gathers the facts, plans a private conversation that separates the person from the task, uncovers caregiving strain and asks human resources about family and medical leave, writes a supportive 60-day improvement plan with targeted training and explains fair documentation, drawing on DeNisi and Murphy, Kluger and DeNisi and Salas and colleagues. Full sample paper, read it free.
HIM 520 Module 5 Final Project Milestone Two example
The second final project milestone designs training and development for a merged 132-person HIM department: a needs analysis from audits, surveys and procedure differences, a competency framework by role, onboarding, cross-site teaching by each hospital's experts, support that helps learning transfer to work, continuing education for credential holders, evaluation at four levels and a budget, drawing on Salas, Blume, Kirkpatrick and Edmondson. Full sample paper, read it free.
HIM 520 Module 6 Ethics Short Paper example
A graduate ethics case: after a patient falls and fractures a hip, a physician asks the HIM director to edit an earlier note so it shows a fall risk assessment that was never documented. The paper separates alteration from a legitimate late entry, explains why audit trails make edits visible, weighs honesty, nonmaleficence and fairness to the patient, considers the pull of liability fear and the value of disclosure and sets out how the director responds and supports the physician, drawing on Gallagher, Mazor, Studdert and Adler-Milstein and colleagues. Full sample paper, read it free.
HIM 520 Module 7 Final Project Milestone Three example
The third final project milestone redesigns release of information for a merged system: three site teams, three logs and turnaround from 4 to 13 days become one team with a single log, requests sorted by type, jobs designed for variety, autonomy and feedback, a staffing model based on volume, a quality check that catches wrong-patient releases, staff involvement in the design and a phased move, drawing on Humphrey, Lye, Mazzocato and Harrison and colleagues. Full sample paper, read it free.
HIM 520 Module 8 Policy Short Paper example
A graduate policy paper that revises a remote work policy written in 2019 for occasional telework, now governing 70% of an HIM department: the policy life cycle, gaps in eligibility, privacy and security, timekeeping, equipment, work across state lines and team connection, input gathered from staff and reviewers, the revised provisions and how the change is communicated and reviewed, drawing on Bloom, Kruse and Hom and colleagues. Full sample paper, read it free.
HIM 520 Module 9 Final Project example
The final project presents a one-year leadership plan for a merged three-hospital HIM department: an executive summary, the director's leadership philosophy, a brief diagnosis, four goals (trust and voice, people development, unified work and retention), a quarter-by-quarter action table, people practices, integrity commitments, communication, measures, risks and a closing statement, drawing on Judge and Piccolo, Cummings, Edmondson, Salas and Hom and colleagues. Full sample paper, read it free.
HIM 520 Module 10 Reflection example
To close the course, the director of a merged HIM department reviews a term of leadership: the discovery that the hardest problems were about people rather than procedures, a near mistake with a struggling coder, the discomfort of refusing a physician and the habit of asking before announcing, with Kluger and DeNisi on how feedback can backfire, Edmondson on psychological safety and Cummings and colleagues on relational leadership. Full sample paper, read it free.
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Using a HIM 520 sample the right way
Read an HIM 520 sample by checking whether each leadership concept is tied to a specific action, whether human resource steps are fair and documented and whether ethical and policy choices protect the integrity of the record. For HIM 520, send the assignment wording, your case department and the rubric; a first custom sample is returned free in 24-48h.
HIM 520 questions, answered
What does HIM 520 cover?
Leadership styles, human resource management, performance appraisal, training and development, ethics, process improvement, work design and policy development in health information management.
How is HIM 520 different from undergraduate management courses?
It expects graduate-level use of research on leadership, feedback, training and work design, applied to complex situations such as departmental mergers.
What makes a strong HIM 520 paper?
Concepts tied to specific actions, fair and documented human resource steps, evidence-based feedback and training and decisions that protect the record.