Introduction
Stamford Hospital is one of the leading hospitals in healthcare provision in Stamford and across Connecticut. The hospital is a nonprofit organization and it has been in the business for more than 100 years. Stamford Hospital is said to have created about 2300 job opportunities for health care providers (Stamford Hospital, 2014). Its vision is to offer quality health care services to its patients.
The hospital uses new technology in its operations and it is one of the Planetree Alliance member hospitals. The Planetree Alliance members are obliged to provide patient-centered services, and this assertion means that all members must focus on maximizing their patients’ satisfaction. The hospital provides medical services in areas such as cancer treatment, cardiac services, orthopedics, and general health (Stamford Hospital, 2014).
Stamford Hospital is a partner of the New York-Presbyterian Healthcare System and a key training partner of the Columbia University, which offers medical courses. The hospital has an employee development program that mainly focuses on equipping workers with the right skills to achieve its corporate goals (Stamford Hospital, 2014).
The hospital recorded its first positive profit margin in 2004 and since then it has posted promising results on its financial accounts. The hospital’s success in the past few years has been attributed to good management. This paper will analyze the company’s management, assess the gaps in the management, and provide some recommendations for future improvement.
Employees’ career development opportunities
For managers and other personnel to accomplish their duties and achieve a corporation’s goals, an education program is necessary to equip them with skills to handle new challenges that come up in the course of executing their duties (Frampton & Charmel, 2008).
Additionally corporate culture becomes obsolete with time, and thus a corporate culture that was successful at one point may not be effective at some other time in the future (Newmark, 2006). In order for a business to achieve its corporate goals, career development should be embraced. Managers should be well equipped with the necessary skills and technical knowhow to handle different situations.
At Stamford, a non-discriminative training program is in place to offer lifetime training to managers and other staff members (Heuer, 2004). The program is based on the corporate culture of the organization and it mostly focuses on new employee orientation, new manager orientation, and other staff development training amongst others (Stamford Hospital, 2014).
New staff recruitment in the hospital is done by the human resources department, which is composed of technical staff in the area of staff management. The hospital considers both skills and the ability of an individual staff to fit in the corporate culture within which the company is established.
In addition, the hospital assesses the ability and attitudes of the candidate towards teamwork, accountability, and respect for other staff members and patients (Stamford Hospital, 2014). The aforementioned factors considered during the hiring process ensure that only the right staff members join the hospital’s workforce, this leading to increased patient satisfaction. The major components of the training program are discussed below.
New Employee Orientation
The hospital management provides every new staff with a 3-days training that centers on the nature of the corporate culture in the organization. The program enables new employees to understand the spirit in the organization coupled with preparing them for their new tasks.
Additionally, new employees get firsthand information on the hospital’s mission, vision, and values. Given that Stamford Hospital works under the Planetree philosophy of patient-centered care, the 3-days orientation program assists the new staff members to understand the organization’s major goal, which is to ensure patient satisfaction and the role they owe the hospital regarding the accomplishment of that goal (Heuer, 2004).
The program also introduces the new staff members to the code of ethics that guides every employee in the company. This aspect is crucial since it defines the “dos” and “don’ts” in the organization.
The overall result of the orientation program is that it brings all the staff members together to work as a team in a bid to achieve a common goal (Daft & Marcic, 2005). The orientation program is important since the employees are drawn from different cultural and religious backgrounds, and thus it welcomes the new staff to the company and establishes a bond between them.
New Manager Orientation
The success or failure of a business venture depends on the management (Frampton & Charmel, 2008). On the other hand, poor management leads to a business’ failure while good management leads to success.
Stamford Hospital is aware of this view and thus it has introduced a “new manager-training program, which provides new managers with a general overview of the hospital’s human resources policies and procedures, budgets, corporate compliance, and Kronos timekeeping” (Stamford Hospital, 2014, par.17).
Through the program, new managers meet and interact with other new and senior managers and engage in an open discussion where each person has a chance to contribute his or her ideas. Regular assessment of the new managers is done for a period of one year in a bid to ensure that shortfalls and deviations are detected in time.
The Leadership Academy
This program is “only accessible to leaders and managers from different levels in the organization” (Stamford Hospital, 2014, par. 18). The program aims at supplementing the leadership skills already possessed by the leaders with some new skills with the sole aim of increasing their efficiency.
The program takes in classroom work in fields that relate to strategic management and it centers mainly on maximizing performance coupled with binding managers from different levels in order to achieve the corporate goals. Training is offered under the watch of the hospital’s staff members if not outsourced (Newmark, 2006).
The aim of the training may be strategic goal alignment, talent retention, teamwork, health work relations, motivation, and visionary leadership among others (Frampton & Charmel, 2008).
Online Training
In addition to the aforementioned courses, the hospital also offers online courses to its employees. The courses that the hospital offers to its staff members through the new technology include sexual bullying, corporate acquiescence, handling emergency cases, patient wellbeing, and cultural diversity among others.
Staff Development training
This program aims at developing skills and competence amongst the junior staff members. The program offers courses designed to improve the employees’ skills coupled with boosting their job satisfaction. The courses are designed in such a way that they address changes in the business environment so that employees are flexible enough to tackle challenges that arise in their line of duty (Daft & Marcic, 2005).
This program is continuous and it runs throughout the employee’s tenure in the hospital on top of covering areas acknowledged as fundamental to thriving performance (Frampton & Charmel, 2008). All employees are encouraged to enroll in employee empowerment courses, which are accessible to all people. Courses such as conflict management and communication are offered in this program.
Managing staff turnover
The hospital has a supporting program for incoming nurses known as the Graduates Engaged Mastering Succeeding (GEMS) program (Heuer, 2004). ‘GEMS’ is a 12 week program and aims at ensuring successful transition of fresh health care professionals into the work environment. Throughout the 12 weeks, the nurses are trained on the hospital’s policies and procedures.
Each nurse is assigned an experienced mentor who guides him or her through the orientation process. The program ensures smooth transition from a mere student to a practicing nurse. Once hired, a nurse is under obligation to enroll for a BSN degree program within the first year of service in the hospital (Newmark, 2006). The course goes on for five years after which the nurse will be highly knowledgeable and competent.
The mentors continue to guide the nurses even after the orientation period. Such support provides an incentive for competent nurses to remain in the hospital. In addition, the hospital also offers competitive salary to its staff depending on the position held.
The high pay and employee development programs adopted by the company provide incentives for staff members to remain in the hospital, thus retaining the best employees. Fringe benefits are also offered to the staff aimed at increasing their morale and motivation.
Outpatient vs. inpatient services
In the recent past, the Stamford Hospital’s management has shifted its focus from investing in inpatient to outpatient facilities (Stamford Hospital, 2014). The reason behind this new development is that technological advancements have characterized the health sector, thus improving surgical treatments.
This aspect has led to a decrease in inpatient cases. The hospital has employed extra physicians to increase efficiency of its outpatient services. The company is said to derive more revenue from outpatient services than it does from inpatient services.
Criticism
Critics have been alleging that nonprofit organizations pay their managers huge amounts of money in the name of retaining the best talents (Frampton & Charmel, 2008). This allegation results in high cost of health care provision. Stamford Hospital, as one of the nonprofit organizations, is no exception.
The company is claimed to have paid Brian Grissler’s, the then company CEO, fringe benefits amounting to $618,000, which represented a 400 percent increase compared to the previous year. The hospital’s management holds that in order to retain experienced staff, it must pay them huge amounts of cash.
Such huge salaries have been cited as the major reasons for the rise of health care costs, thus leading to inaccessibility of healthcare services by the poor in society. Considering the view that Stamford Hospital is a member of the Planetree Alliance where customer satisfaction is the key objective, the hospital may not be in a position to achieve this important goal owing to the high costs of its services (Daft & Marcic, 2005).
Statistics indicate that more than 400,000 people in Connecticut do not have a health care insurance policy, and thus the high cost of health care resulting from this exorbitant CEOs’ pay may lead to reduced customer satisfaction (Spinelli, 2006).
The hospital has also been criticized for neglecting its employees (Heuer, 2004). As aforementioned, the hospital is a member of the Planetree Alliance, which requires member hospitals to ensure patient satisfaction at all costs. The hospital has been accused of working towards ensuring patient satisfaction and overlooking its employees’ needs (Newmark, 2006).
This aspect has led to poor morale amongst the employees, this resulting in high staff turnover rate. Loss of experienced staff members means that the hospital may not be in a position to meet its key objective of ensuring customer satisfaction in the end.
The hospital’s nursing department has also been criticized for malpractices in giving promotions. Critics claim that promotions in the department are based on friendship as opposed to merit.
In this department, workers’ experience is not considered and often the old workers are disregarded and in most cases bullied by younger supervisors who find themselves into management positions through unmerited means (Frampton & Charmel, 2008).
Recommendations
The hospital should set up a committee to assess and determine salaries to be given to each employee based on his or her work requirements. The committee should also consider the salaries paid to other staff members holding similar positions in other similar hospitals. Such comparison will help to avert cases of CEOs in the hospital earning higher amounts of money as compared to their counterparts in other hospitals.
At Stamford Hospital, it is alleged that Grissler, the company’s CEO, earned $376,000 more than the CEO of Hartford Hospital despite the latter being charged with more responsibilities than Grissler and the Hartford Hospital earning almost 3 times more than the Stamford Hospital (Newmark, 2006).
Both customer satisfaction and employees’ satisfaction are two conflicting interests (Heuer, 2004). Achievement of one of the two goals may hinder the achievement of the other. The hospital management should balance the two conflicting issues without overlooking the employees’ satisfaction as this trend may lead to reduced morale and failure to meet the patients’ needs.
The hospital management should engage its employees in making key decisions and establish good communication channels. Good communication between employees and the management will assist managers to understand the employees’ feelings on the corporate culture that is currently in place, hence evoke the possibility of revising it or even dropping it all together.
The hospital should offer promotions based on merit as opposed to favors. Each nurse should have equal opportunity to be promoted. Performance and experience should be assessed and the best performing staff selected (Frampton & Charmel, 2008). Harassment and bullying in the nursing department should be illegalized and each worker should be free to report such cases to the top management.
Conclusion
Stamford Hospital is one of the leading hospitals in the provision of healthcare services in Connecticut. Its management is focused on two main issues, viz. patients’ satisfaction and employees’ empowerment. However, customer satisfaction is highly acknowledged since the hospital is a member of the Planetree Alliance whose main emphasize is on patient satisfaction.
The hospital has recorded success in the past one decade probably due to good management. The hospital provides its employees with career development opportunities through training programs. The company’s focus is to retain experienced employees so that customer satisfaction can be achieved.
However, the hospital faces criticism over mistreatment of its workers and discrimination of a certain group of workers during promotion. It has also been accused of paying its CEOs hefty amounts of cash in the name of retaining the best talents.
References
Daft, L., & Marcic, D. (2005). Understanding management. Boston, MA: Cengage Learning.
Frampton, B., & Charmel, P. (2008). Putting patients first: best practices in patient-centered care. New York, NY: John Wiley & Sons.
Heuer, J. (2004). Hospital accreditation and patient satisfaction: testing the relationship. Journal for healthcare quality, 26(1), 46-51.
Newmark, J. (2006). From talk to action: what performance improvement is really all about. Radiology management, 29(3), 18-30.
Spinelli, R. (2006). The applicability of Bass’s model of transformational, transactional, and laissez-faire leadership in the hospital administrative environment. Hospital topics, 84(2), 11-19.
Stamford Hospital: About Stamford Hospital. (2014). Web.