Research background
Total quality management is critical in monitoring the efficiency and proactive organisational culture in line with the objective, goals, and mission of such an organisation. Quality improvement facilitates sustainable and optimal use of resources in service delivery.
Sheik Khalifa Hospital has been in operation for more than three decades. The hospital is government-owned and renowned for its quality medical services. The hospital has been in the forefront of managing quality through intrinsic implementation of the ISO standards expected of them.
This research proposal attempts to explicitly review the total quality management approach adopted by the Sheik Khalifa Hospital located in Ajman as part of the ISO standards for improving the hospital’s quality management strategies.
Problem Statement
Sheik Khalifa Hospital has several strategies for ensuring quality in service delivery and systems management. In fact, the hospital has achieved certification credits for its endeavours to create a tight management system within its operations.
In many jurisdictions, it is mandatory to have independent TQM processes in the health care institutions. Fortunately, implementation of the ISO standards in the Sheik Khalifa Hospital is efficient and has taken up key control issues. Thus, it is important to review some of the implementation strategies and relate them to the ISO standards.
Significance of the study
Implementation of the ISO standards strategy is a systematic measure that is instituted by an organisation in order to maintain efficient and cost-effective operation matrix. Further, Implementation of ISO standards aid in safeguarding assets and resources of an entity, deterring and detecting errors, fraud and theft and sustain accuracy and completeness management strategies.
Therefore, it is important to have effective ISO standards for controls within an organisation to ensure efficiency. The results of this research may be used by the hospital to improve the total quality management system and implement desirable business decisions which would influence profitability, efficiency, and survival amidst competition and market swings in the health care industry of the UAE.
Research questions
The following are the research questions:
- To what extent, if any, do employee satisfaction and motivation contribute to effective implementation of ISO standards at the Sheik Khalifa Hospital?
- To what extent, if any, does of ISO standards affect performance of the Sheik Khalifa Hospital?
- Is there a relationship between the ISO standards implementation and TQM especially on the facets of efficiency at the Sheik Khalifa Hospital?
- To what extent, if any, does the quality of management practices differ from those of the neighbouring hospitals with the health care industry that Sheik Khalifa Hospital operates in?
- To what extent, if any, do management models minimise easy manipulation of the hospital’s operations records?
The aims and objectives of the research
The aims and objectives of this research paper are:
- Gauge and quantify the reasons for the current level of efficiency associated with the ISO standards implementation strategies of the Sheik Khalifa Hospital.
- Identify the management strengths that exist within the hierarchy of authority and management faculty at the Sheik Khalifa Hospital following the successful implementation of ISO standards.
- Relate the ISO standards adopted by the hospital and their long term goals of efficiencies in management and quality service delivery.
Hypotheses
Below are the null and alternative hypotheses that are based on the research problem.
- H1o. There is no link between management efficiency and ISO standards at the Sheik Khalifa Hospital.
- H1a. There is a link between management efficiency and ISO standards at the Sheik Khalifa Hospital.
- H2o. There is no link between the level of employee satisfaction and successful implementation of the ISO standards at the Sheik Khalifa Hospital.
- H2a. There is a link between the level of employee satisfaction and successful implementation of the ISO standards at the Sheik Khalifa Hospital.
Literature review
According to Pine, Sonneborn, Schindler, Stanek, Maeda, & Hanlon (2012), institutions that have strong ISO standards implantation system are the least affected by inefficiencies since every activity and channel are easy to monitor at minimal cost.
Specifically, the Total Quality Management (TQM) unit of such institutions is objective and engaged in keeping the brand of audit periodically balanced (Pine et al. 2012). The success puzzle for quality improvement and implementation management strategy delivery operates on the periphery of soft skills involving the timeless vision of organisational principles.
Besides, defining value of the business, determining requirements, clarifying the vision, building teams, mitigating task, resolving issues, and providing direction complete the response projections, quality planning focuses on benchmarking of efficiency in the operations and service delivery initiative, accreditation initiative, staff performance and skills assessment initiative.
Reflectively, benchmarking initiative involves streamlining service delivery to ensure efficiency via a proactive quality mitigation channel that reports progress of the intended quality improvement system.
According to Escrig-Tena, Bou-Llusar, Beltran and Roca-Puig (2011), significant quality improvement can only be achieved if the scope of quality is broadly understood within the organisation, and the employees are committed to use their quality knowledge to continuously improve work processes and practices (Escrig-Tena et al. 2011).
Therefore, without ascertaining the existing attitudes within the Sheik Khalifa Hospital toward quality, further steps towards quality improvement through monitoring the ISO standards cannot be taken.
References
Escrig-Tena, A., Bou-Llusar, C., Beltran, M., and Roca-Puig, V. (2011). Modelling the implications of quality management elements of strategic flexibility.Advances in Decision Sciences, 1(1), 1-27.
Pine, M., Sonneborn, M., Schindler, J., Stanek, M., Maeda, J.L., & Hanlon, C. (2012). Harnessing the power of enhanced data for healthcare quality improvement: Lessons from a Minnesota hospital association pilot project. Journal of Healthcare Management, 57(6), 406-407.