Healthcare institutions/organizations are very complex as compared to other business organizations. The business model of this organization/institution is quite different from other business organizations. We are looking at it in this perspective, the customers visiting this organization are not willing to do so but critical circumstances force them. Members of the organization do not get the expected pay because of the nature of the business. Sometimes this business receives uncertain revenue beyond control, and regulatory issues. The management problems in the healthcare are usually difficult to fix.
Problems in the healthcare organizations and the manager’s solution to these problems
A major problem that health care faces is the difficulty in defining its revenue. As compared to other businesses, you can realize that other organizations can come up with goals set up and send its employees out to do their best to meet the organizational goal, but this is not the thing in a health care institution. The revenue objectives for the health institutions are dependent to the heath conditions of the public. A number of hospitals market the services that suit the physicians in relation to the need of the patients. With the unavailability of all the required services within the same heath care, patients will go to the hospitals that can meet their needs.
Cost control is another serious issue in the heath care organizations. For many years that the healthcares have been working, it has become hard to meet the costs. The reason is that there are costs that the heath care organization has to meet. Another issue that makes this cost control to rise much more higher is the state regulations, which mandate the number of given type of staff that should be in for different types of medical procedures or in the health cares. The states also have a regulation towards the time that some departments in the healthcare have to work. This affects the operation of the health care organization an as a result it is unable to work towards the need of catering for all the control costs (Mitchell, (n.d)).
In relation to the cost control we also see that there are some procedures in health cares which are restricted to some specific areas. This means that whether in use or not these areas need orderliness and good maintenance. This preserved areas usually serve as training area for a group of expertise, this is something that may happen once for a very long time. This increases the costs in the organization. We can term this as unnecessary costs because of what we have already explained in the beginning of this paragraph.
Heath care like any other medical institution is very sensitive and requires regular training and certification of the staff. Healthcare deals with people’s lives and therefore requires more attention. With this kind of organization, there should be continuous education coming from the cost of medical facilities. The certified professionals must study for a given period in order to keep themselves updated with any new thing in the field of medicine. In the heath institutions or hospitals, the employees must assume some training in accordance to the job-related heath and the safety management. It is of great significance that the institution matins the documentation of quality standards as because it is a requirement by the joint commission. Even though all organizations has to meet the quality of standards, it is not as strict as the medical departments. Maintained training and continuous learning of new things is a mandatory as well as a necessity in the heath care organization. Like it or not in a medical organization or health care you have to meet such costs in order to provide quality services to the customers.
Charity care is another issue to the healthcares. It is mandatory to the healthcares to provide charity care to the patients that fall in the category of low-income levels. The physicians as well provide charity care to these patients. Some hospitals generate low income to meet the charity provision but they just have to do it. This makes such healthcares fall into a tough financial position. The state reimburses hospitals or healthcares that offer charity care to the patients but the reimbursement still does not meet the extra cost incurred by the hospital towards offering the services to the patients. When we measure the reimbursed amount against the actual cost of the healthcare or the hospital, we will observe that the cost is still on a higher side thus making it hard for such an organization to obtain profitability.
From the above management problems, the workers in healthcare can become unmotivated. Especially when the finances in this organization becomes a problem because of many expenses such as training and regular education to the technical department and provision of charity care to the patience can result to the delay of payment or low payment to the worker of this institution. This will therefore push the management to a crisis where the workers are unwilling to provide waxing services.
Being a manager in such an institution is not easy and therefore requires more techniques on how to handle the institution as a whole and the employees as well. Actually, management in any organization or institution is the means of bringing people together in order to accomplish desired objectives and goals. Management itself includes planning, organizing staffing and leading. For a successful institution, a manager needs to practice all the steps of management. In a simpler way, we can define management as a human designed action that facilitates production of constructive solutions from an organization. In this view, there is an open chance of self-management and ability to manage others as well (Managementhelp, (n.d))
For a manager in healthcare to fix these management problems he/she has to adopt high management skills and develop some motivation theories to the employees in the organization. On analyzing the management problems you can realize that one problem leads to another and when not fixed it grows to a more complex problem that may lead to a downfall of an organization. A manager should therefore be flexible, think quickly and develop new ideas towards solving the management problem.
Mayo’s Motivation theory
A manager can apply Mayo’s motivation theory of motivation to the organization in order to solve a management problem emerging from the employee side. Elton Mayo a professor of Harvard, undertook an experiment at the Hawthorne Western Electric Company. The main aim of the experiment was to identify the factors than exhaustion that would weaken the workers productivity. He carried out the testing by picking two women groups and put them in separate rooms. The first group was to be the control group, in this group of women the physical surrounding remained unchanged. In the other group, there was altering of the condition, the experiment group had to undergo an alteration whereby here was an alteration various features in the physical surrounding. In the research the researcher recorded the level of output, and then he made a record and came up with a comparison between the outputs of the first group and the second group. An outcome of the experiment showed that the controlled group had an increase in its output without having its surrounding group altered. From this, the researcher did not come out with satisfactory results so He decided to experiment more by reducing the pay of the women in the controlled groups. The researcher concluded in the study that the working conditions and pay do not drive the customers, like the psychological wants and desires, which could be achieved by the satisfied groups. The opportunity by employees to make decision regarding the activities either as personally or in a group turn out to be an incentive to treat them more significantly. The supervisors have to recognize the effort of the workers making them to feel that they form a unique and important contribution and the importance of organization. This conclusion will always help to improve management (Envision software (n.d)).
If we apply Elton’s motivation theory to the healthcare organization as a form of management we will gain an improvement. The reason is that the biggest problem facing the healthcares is the low finances that may affect the employees if not addressed. With Elton’s motivation theory, the employees will not feel lowly paid. Instead, they will appreciate the fact that they have recognition as important entities of the organization. With this, a manger can concentrate on how to improve on how to make an improvement of his employees and the whole organization. This theory is important because it aids the manager to plan and organize for the future of the organization and its employees.
References
Envision software. The Hawthorne Experiment and Employee Motivation. Web.
Managementhelp. Basic Skills in management and leadership. Web.
Mitchell M. Management Problem in Healthcares. Web.