Project Description
The present project aims to address the issues of high employee turnover in Belmont Village by determining the specific aspects that have to be included in the sustainability program. During the past four months, Belmont Village has been facing the issues of increasing employee turnover, as well as the problems associated with employee loss, such as decreasing treatment quality, client dissatisfaction, and decreased productivity.
The project will also define the goals and objectives to be achieved by Belmont Village in order to reduce high employee turnover, taking into account the specifics of the organization and employees’ opinions. The methodology used for the project involves qualitative methods of data collection, including employee surveys. The results of the surveys will be analyzed to determine the overall rates of factors influencing employee turnover levels, such as teamwork, workplace satisfaction, communication, employee involvement, and loyalty. Identifying the persistent problems can help to outline the reasons for high turnover rate, thus creating an opportunity to devise a clear strategy to eradicate the issue.
The proposed methodology can also help the organization to better understand its strengths and weaknesses, which can be addressed in the future development plan or used to change certain employee management practices in place to increase effectiveness. Overall, the proposed project can help Belmont Village to understand the reasons for high turnover, as well as the individual aspects of development that can aid in addressing the issue. The program will be especially useful to the organization’s management, as it will enable them to improve operations and practices to ensure lower employee turnover, higher quality of care, improved health outcomes, better employee engagement, and higher morale across the workforce.
Problem Statement
Belmont Village has incurred a high turnover rate in the past four months. It has been hiring employees that either quit before the training is over or after they start working on their own. It has also been losing its longtime employees, which has become a red flag that something is terribly wrong but no one seems to do anything about it other than to continue hiring new employees without investigating where the problem lies.
The high turnover rate is a major problem for many organizations as it can trigger a variety of other issues. Some areas of business, such as retail shops or restaurants, generally have high employee turnover due to external factors, including seasonal nature of work, employing students, large share of part-time and temporary workers, etc. In these businesses, high turnover is an essential part of the workflow, and it does not result in lower profits or poor quality of service.
However, for the companies operating in the healthcare industry, high employee turnover can lead to impaired patient health outcomes, as well as other operational issues. First of all, the shortage of nurses and other medical practitioners is evident throughout the United States (Collini, Guidroz, & Perez, 2015), which means that it may take longer to find a replacement worker. While the position remains empty, the institution incurs additional operational costs, including overtime pay for other employees, employee search expenses, and more.
Once the candidate is found, however, the problem is not solved, as he or she has to go through extensive training, which is also expensive to the organization. Other effects of high employee turnover include decreased productivity, reduced company revenue and profitability. It can also impair the workforce effectiveness by reducing employee morale, increasing the occurrence of patient errors, compromising the quality of care, and influencing work environment and culture.
High employee turnover also has an adverse effect on teamwork, as it leads to distrust, dissatisfaction, loss of organizational knowledge, as well as additional turnover. Organizational issues resulting from high turnover can make it even harder for a company to attract new staff members: for instance, reviews from past employees can have a negative impact on the company image, thus making it less appealing to potential highly qualified personnel.
Addressing high turnover rate in healthcare institutions is a difficult task, as it may be hard to determine the reasons for increased job dissatisfaction. Previous studies suggest that factors specific to the nursing profession, such as burnout, depression, and stress can influence the nurses’ intention to leave (Chiang & Chang, 2012). Moreover, organizational factors such as unit size, workplace location, and leadership style can also increase the rates of turnover in medical care institutions (Currie & Hill, 2012).
The organizations can address the high turnover rate issue by doing an internal research to identify unit-specific reasons for increased turnover, thus determining the ways to address the situation. In the past, Belmont Village has used mentors for new employees to ensure that they stay in their positions after training; in addition, efforts including retraining of the existing employees and redefining job roles can be useful in reducing the turnover rate. With a fully staffed organization and a low turnover rate, the company’s revenue will increase.
Low turnover is generally quite productive, which is because the employees know and trust each other and are better at performing their specific duties. The employees are likely to be more loyal to the company and more willing to devote their personal energy to the job. Most importantly, a low turnover rate makes it easier for a company to focus its time and energy on the needs of patients and the business, rather than searching for and adapting to new staff.
Significance of the Study
Significance for the Writer
As a future healthcare worker, it is crucial for me to understand the internal processes that are part of medical institutions. In health care settings, a strong workforce is a key to the company’s profitability, as it can help to ensure better health outcomes for patients, decrease operational costs, promote teamwork, and increase the overall employee engagement and morale. High rates of turnover, on the other hand, have an adverse impact on all aspects of health care operations, which leads to a variety of internal issues, as well as bad organizational reputation and profitability.
In order to be effective in my future role as a healthcare professional, it is important to know the reasons for high turnover and to be aware of the possible ways to address this issue. For instance, if I notice employee retention issues as I begin working at a new care facility in the future, I can approach the management with useful suggestions on how to address the problem based on the knowledge obtained from this project.
Thus, I can play a significant part in improving workplace conditions and helping the organization to achieve its profitability goals. On the other hand, if I receive a managerial role in a medical facility, I will know the effective path to reducing and preventing high turnover, which will help me to be more effective in my role. Thus, this research can expand my knowledge of the reasons and solutions for high turnover, which will help me in my future work.
Significance for the Major Stakeholders
High turnover in healthcare settings can also impact a whole range of stakeholders, which is why researching the topic and finding solutions to the problem is important to these stakeholder groups. For the patients, high turnover means a lower quality of care and higher rates of medical errors, which can impair health outcomes. For the management and the organization, the loss of workers leads to increased costs of hiring and training, as well as to internal issues, such as the lack of employee motivation, low morale, and impaired engagement. All of these matters affect the company’s profitability and reputation, making it more difficult to recruit and maintain efficient operations.
For nurses and other medical personnel, higher turnover is also an important issue as it leads to lower job stability, as well as increased stress, the risk of burnout, and impaired job satisfaction. Overall, it is clear that high employee turnover at Belmont Village affects all of the major stakeholders involved. Addressing the issue in a meaningful way, however, would lead to better health outcomes, higher revenues, and improved reputation of the organization. Moreover, it would also reduce internal issues by lowering stress and building a solid workforce with high levels of involvement and morale.
Global Healthcare Significance
The subject of the research is also significant for the global healthcare industry. According to Collini et al. (2015), “Registered nurse (RN) turnover averaged 14% in previous years (KPMG 2011) and the current nursing shortage is expected to continue to spread across the USA” (p. 169). On one hand, nursing shortage indicates that there is a stable and growing demand for professional nurses in the industry. On the other hand, the scale of the issue indicates that certain management problems in the healthcare industry remain unaddressed, which causes issues with employee retention. Therefore, this research can serve to indicate the individual problems that cause the high turnover issues and provide guidance for other institutions on the possible pathways to retaining employees.
References
Chiang, Y. M., & Chang, Y. (2012). Stress, depression, and intention to leave among nurses in different medical units: Implications for healthcare management/nursing practice. Health Policy, 108(2), 149-157.
Collini, S. A., Guidroz, A. M., & Perez, L. M. (2015). Turnover in health care: The mediating effects of employee engagement. Journal of Nursing Management, 23(2), 169-178.
Currie, E. J., & Hill, R. A. C. (2012). What are the reasons for high turnover in nursing? A discussion of presumed causal factors and remedies. International Journal of Nursing Studies, 49(9), 1180-1189.