Book excerpt: This book shows how the integrity and values of professional healthcare administrators contribute to defining and implementing the organization's moral core. The thirty cases in this book provide a new perspective that recognizes that every decision you make and every activity you undertake have the potential to compromise or enhance the moral core of your healthcare organization. Topics include: using concepts, resources, and tools that prepare you to sustain and enhance the moral core of the healthcare organization you manage; assessing the ethical and legal frameworks currently relied on by healthcare organizations; why personal value systems are important and how they are developed by healthcare administrators; exploring the idea of organizational culture and ethical climate; and learning how to recognize and manage moral distress, which develops when personal values conflict with the culture of the organization. --