Chapter twelve dubbed training and development combines the two fundamentals of creating a good workforce. The training component involves the improvement of the personal and professional skills of the employees in relation to the duties carried out in the organization. Development relates to competency improvement for the employee, more so for future professional pursuits. The thirteenth chapter, relates to performance appraisal which deals with ensuring that employees are doing what they are supposed to do and that their respective contributions match with the objectives of the organization. Chapter fourteen deals with the exponentially complex area of compensation in the healthcare sector. It deals with inter alia balancing the complexities of remuneration to create an internal fairness within the organization while still retaining an external competiveness. Finally, chapter 15 relates to labor relations and mainly deals with the issue of labor unions within the health sector. Canvassed issues include why staff members join labor unions and how administrators should deal with the unionization issue.
The Critique
Organizational Setting
The Organization
The organization on focus herein is the Henry Mayo Newhall Hospital, situated in the Los Angeles’ Santa Clarita Valley. Henry Mayo is relatively large 43-year old hospital with 238 beds, a variety of specialties and just under two thousand employees. The center is a community hospital, hence not for profit and also works closely with The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services who have given it a four star rating.
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Demographics of the Staff & Clients
The term ‘mixed’ best describes the demographics of both the staff and the clients served at the hospital, mainly in terms of racial and ethnic affiliation. With the hospital being located within the proximity of Los Angeles, it serves a combined collection of different demographics. In terms of social stratum, the staff within the hospital mainly comprise of highly trained professionals. Conversely, the clients attended are mainly in the lower echelons of the social stratum including those who rely on Medicare and Medicaid. However, the hospital does have an executive wing for affluent clients, most of whom are also donors.
Services Provided
A wide ranging set of services are provides at Henry Mayo with specialists from over seventy disciplines. The hospital has a massive trauma center complete with a state of the art emergency room. Acute care is also provided at the hospital, but on a short term basis. In recent years, the hospital has also been specializing in cardiovascular disease and related non-communicable diseases.
Organizational Climate
Overview of the Climate in the Organization
The organization climate at Henry Mayo is dominated by the fact that it is a not-for-profit player in the healthcare sector hence its core obligation is to help those most in need. The over a thousand professionals who work at Henry Mayo are sometimes overworked and under-remunerated but they are always proud of what they do and willing to go the extra-mile as they consider it a service to humanity.
The Guiding Philosophy
Based on Henry Mayo’s vision, its guiding philosophy is to surpass expectations specifically in what the patients care about most. The hospital is thus focused on patient satisfaction and producing the best outcomes for its patients (Ginter, Duncan, & Swayne, 2018).
The Stated and Unstated Values
For Henry Mayo, the patient always comes first since there are no internal stakeholders who are seeking to make a profit. The values of the organization are thus centered on making a difference within the community it serves. The organization also places a very high value on its members of staff, more so due to the strenuous work they undertake, more often than not without proper compensation. Finally, the organization seeks to make a positive impression on one of the most important external stakeholders who are its donors.
Type of Organization
Henry Mayo falls within the American Hospital Association (AHA) definition of a community hospital. It is a non-profit hospital with a close affiliation with the local community and without direct connections to the federal government (AHA, 2018). Its key obligation is to ensure the public and personal health of the local community it serves. Finally, Henry Mayo is open to walk in clients of all walks of life and is obligated in the very least to provide them with primary care.
Human Resource Needs
The human resource needs at Henry Mayo can be divided into specialists, professionals, and support staff. The specialists include consultants and experts in the different clinical fields handled at the hospital. The professionals include doctors, APNs, RNs, IT specialists, and administrators (Ginter, Duncan, & Swayne, 2018). Finally, support staff includes technicians, carters and janitors among others.
The Decision-making Process
The hospital is led by a board of directors who include representatives from the community, representatives from the donors, representatives from the professionals and two ex-official members, the Chief Executive Officer, and Chief of Staff. The board of directors is the principle decision-making organ while the CEO and chief of staff handle the day to day management of the organization.
Forming Relationships, Adapt to the Environment, and Terminate
As with most hospitals, no professional is an island except for top management as each professional affiliation has several members. Despite the rigorous work schedules, interpersonal relationship are healthily developed within the organization. Further, most employees perform within teams made up of members of different professions where inter-professional personal relationships can be forged (Ginter, Duncan, & Swayne, 2018). The administrators have the daunting obligation of ensuring that personal differences do not inordinately affect operations in the hospital.
Conclusion
The aforementioned four chapters created a realization that the running of a healthcare institution goes beyond the proviso of clinical services as it also includes the bringing together of different professionals who need to work together harmoniously. Human resource management and related organizational culture is thus critical to the success of such an institution. Even after setting up the infrastructure necessary for a hospital and hiring the best possible staff, a lot lies on how the hospital will be managed and how staff members will interact with one another. Among the main challenges realized in those chapters lies on how hospital administrators have to balance between the different professionals represented in a hospital setting and ensure that the different parties work together in harmony (Ginter, Duncan, & Swayne, 2018). It is indeed daunting to run a healthcare institution.
References
AHA. (2018). Fast Facts on U.S. Hospitals, 2018 | AHA. Retrieved from https://www.aha.org/statistics/fast-facts-us-hospitals
Ginter, P. M., Duncan, W. J., & Swayne, L. E. (2018). The strategic management of health care organizations . Hoboken, New Jersey: John Wiley & Sons
