Innovative Management in Health Services: Telemedicine - Research Paper Example

 Innovative Management Part 1. Value Creation Applications of Telemedicine The need for effective and quality health services in remote corners like villages and other distant township areas has led to the rapid growth of the telemedicine services. Further with the advancement in internet applications transforming the world into a global village the applications of telemedicine has earned signified potential. Telemedicine application that started first in the 1990s has encompassed a larger space in the medical industry ranging from general and hospital facilities to other specialized fields like radiology, gynecology, urology and others (Brear 23). Telemedicine in today’s world has found out a large number of uses right from the field of rendering specialized healthcare services to the ailing population to similar fields of education and research. Similarly the use of the telemedicine technology also earns recognition in the field of public administration concerning electronic and telephonic healthcare services. Further research is continually being carried out in the field of telemedicine to largely incorporate its services in the domain of microsurgery and psychiatric consultation services involving video conferencing facilities (Institute of Medicine and Field 1). The large scale application of telemedicine services in the global landscape has not only helped in enhancing the quality of health care services but also helped in reducing the potential cost related to such. Telemedicine helps in rendering active social support to poor patients and thereby enhances the quality parameter of the lives of such individuals (Lazakidou 244). Competitor’s Offerings in Telemedicine Large companies operating in United States and United Kingdom are continually working on to deliver the best possible telemedicine services to the global market. Companies like Meditech, Siemens and McKesson based in United States has become successful in the production of informative services in the field of advanced healthcare. Similarly the medical arm of Global Electronics and Cerner operating in United States has also become largely successful in widely incorporating Information Technology systems to enhance the dimension of healthcare services. Companies like General Electric, Siemens and Philips operating in the developed markets have also turned out to be potential competitors of Logitech in that they have become successful in devising software that would help in the effective transmission of X-Ray images through networking facilities. The above product produced by General Electric and Siemens was found to be quite expensive for which other small companies like Canon, Cerner and Kodak also started devising such products at affordable rates. This enhanced the competition in the telemedicine industry in United States (Blackwell 234-235). Other small companies like the CardioNet Inc. based in United States has also turned out to be a competitor in the field of telemedicine in producing a mobile device that helps the patient in monitoring the heart beat rate, monitoring the ECG parameters and thereby in gaining the right suggestion from the physicians (Datamonitor 13). Another corporation like the Philips Healthcare Systems based in United States provides telemedicine products and services pertaining to homecare solutions for immobile patients and health information and monitoring services (Datamonitor-a 5). LifeWatch AG based in United States provides telephonic healthcare services mainly for patients suffering from chronic diseases pertaining to cardiovascular diseases (Datamonitor-b 14). Target Markets and Product Offerings Telemedicine happens to gain an emerging market owing to its innovative approaches in not delivering the state of the art medical infrastructures helpful for both the patient population and the physicians but also contributing largely to the development of research activities. Moreover with the help of the growth of telemedicine market the government of the region along with the regulatory bodies is happening to gain control over the medical and health administration issues and thereby is working on to render effective health policies. Thus the patients, doctors, researchers, educationalists, government and other regulatory bodies stand out to be the effective target market for telemedicine (Mun and Turner 609). The product and service offerings for telemedicine can be observed based on a myriad number of fields like in financial areas in hospitals helping in billing activities. It also serves as an effective support for making decisions pertaining to operations and human resources in healthcare organizations. In the operational sector the system helps in the effective registration and admission of patients in hospitals. The system also helps in generation of needed reports and large databases pertaining to management of patients. Telemedicine systems also help the researchers and the doctors in conducting effective diagnosis of the disease and thereby also help in enhancing the monitoring activities related to such (Bashshur, Reardon and Shannon 623). Part 2. Managerial Planning and Goals PEST Analysis Political Government and Regulatory bodies earn further potential in bringing out potential regulations and policies through the use of telemedicine systems. The growth of the telemedicine market in developed countries has led to the reduction in employment patterns for doctors leading to complaints from medical regulatory bodies. The clinical regulatory bodies in United States largely require the telemedicine companies to abide by licensing requirements. That enhances the legislative paradigm related to such. Economic Telemedicine services help in reduction of the economic cost of the medical companies. Deregulatory and open market mechanism in developed economies largely help in attracting large amount of investments for expansion of the telemedicine market. Growth of telemedicine market signifies growth and development of commercial, educational and research related venues. Social Social and ethical constructs obstruct the flow of potential information and databases on the basis of such electronic and internet mediums. Ethical constructs further require that telemedicine services offering clinical help and solutions need to conduct the same supported by legal documentation. Technological The technological paradigm of the telemedicine market moves to incorporate newer dimensions like video-conferencing facilities. Moreover the telemedicine system also helps in the effective maintenance of large volumes of electronic data. Mobile telemedicine services also focuses on incorporation of developed technologies like GSM and satellite devices for effective communication activities. The Political Climate demands that the Telemedicine companies need to gain potential licenses before starting on operations. Government and health regulation bodies through gain in rendering effective regulations via the Telemedicine medium still obstruct its rapid growth owing to the fear of doctors losing their professional effectiveness. The growth of the telemedicine market signifies the reduction of cost for the medical organizations while endeavoring to render effective services to people dwelling in remote areas. With the growth of internet such activities can be conducted quite easily. Thus large scale investment and commercialization is encouraged in such sector along with the growth of a deregulatory climate (Darkins and Carry). The social and ethical paradigms however obstruct the free flow of communication and data through the internet network upon which the Telemedicine activity works owing to lack of privacy issues. Further the social paradigms also require the activities to be supported by legal documentations. Telemedicine industry works based on technological pursuits that help in the effective storage of large volumes of electronic data. The process is gaining further modification through the incorporation of technologies like video conferencing. Moreover mobile telemedicine networks are also endeavoring to gain the advantage of GSM and Satellite communication technologies to help in rendering more effective services (Stanberry 618-624). Motivation Plan to Enhance Employee Competitiveness The business organization needs to conduct large amount of motivational activities to help in enhancing the competitive potential of the people. Theoretically speaking the Hierarchy of Needs model as rendered by Abraham Maslow requires the business organization to not only take care of the physical needs of the individuals through effective compensation systems but must also work in recognizing their endeavors. Moreover, Logitech requires opening up a lot of career opportunities for the people in the concern to help in enhancing their performance potentials. The company should also include separate insurance policies in tune with the human resource regulations so as to enhance the security paradigm of the employee’s job concerns. Similarly analysis made on the Herzberg’s Two Factor model based on motivational and hygiene factors it can be stated that the environment, salary conditions, team working conditions between employee groups and with senior levels as well as cooperative regulatory mechanisms help in motivating the people to enhance their competitiveness in the concern. Apart from the stated basic factors in holding the employee morale the organization can hold weekly meets to help encourage the employees by recognizing their activities and aptly rewarding them. Further training activities can be enhanced in the concern to help in augmenting the competiveness of the people pertaining to sectors like consumer servicing (Sharma and Parashar 87-88). Part 3. Innovation Management In order to generate and sustain innovation and creativity in the organization the concern need to create larger roles in the concern that would help in the effective deliveries of such activities. Firstly the activity should be headed by the Director of Innovation in the concern who would help in formulation of effective strategies which in turn would help in the optimal utilization of existing resources for helping the concern gain competiveness in the long run. The strategy should be devised by the director focusing on the future needs of the concern in gaining a wide market base. The Director in turn should also focus on enhancing the communication paradigm with the different people pertaining to different levels to help them understand the strategic objectives and modify their skills accordingly. In the second level the entire innovation and creative project should be divided based on separate task roles. Each of the different creative teams should be rightly administered by an Innovation Leader. The role of the Innovation Leader hovers around selecting the different creative projects and thereby aligning the different resources required in effectively implementing the same within the stipulated time period. This person is also responsible for motivating the people to work effectively for the concern through teamwork initiatives. Another potential role that can be designed in consonance with the second level of Innovation Leader is that of an Innovative Coach. While the Innovation Leader tends to carry out the high end innovative activities for the organization to help in the enhancement of potential revenues the Innovation Coach is required to help in the enhancement of the knowledge level of the teams. The innovation coach in this regard actively works with the human resource department in the concern to help in the designing of effective training programs that in turn would help in enhancing the potential of the people in the concern. Such training programs need to focus on the strategic objectives underlined beforehand. The coach must work in reducing the gaps between the performance levels of the employees to that of the standards set based on the innovation strategy objectives. Similarly for organizations like Logitech that operates based on a large employee base spread along different cultural regions round the world like China, Japan, Switzerland, United States and Taiwan a separate role for an Innovative Scout can be created. This role helps in linking the people pertaining to different cultures and thereby encourages them to actively cooperate with each other in regards to sharing of potential ideas. Sharing of ideas among employees pertaining to different geographical boundaries helps the organization in gaining effective knowledge in regards to different market areas. Thus the organization can work on different innovation and creative pursuits to help in addressing the needs of markets spread along international territories. The creation of an innovative or creative organization also demands the creation of the role of Innovative Catalyst. The person assigned this role holds the responsibility in enticing and encouraging the employees through active communication pursuits in order to excite their feelings to conduct innovative and creative actions. An Innovation Catalyst in such process can carry out potential meets with different people in the concern especially in recess times to gain potential feedback from the people. Gaining potential feedback helps the catalyst in designing motivational activities to encourage the people to help create newer designs and processes for the concern. The Innovation Catalyst in such pursuits is required to directly report to the Innovation Director. Finally the Innovative or the Creative Organization must also depend on a role known as the Future Scout. The person designated as Future Scout is required to render potential ideas to the Innovation Director and Leader of the concern based on the changes in the market mechanism. The Future Scout tends to evaluate the different trends pertaining to social and cultural values of the economy, changes pertaining to the technological and economic paradigms of the region and also changes in the pattern of buyer behavior. Effective evaluation based on such paradigms would help the concern in modifying the creative pursuits taken. Thus innovations planned would not turn obsolete before being implemented (Stamn 334-335). Part 4. Strategic Leadership In order to create a change culture in the organization firstly the strategic leadership must focus on understanding the requirement for the change process to be brought out in the organization. The change manager implementing the change process must focus on the external environment in order to understand the extent to which different variables have changed and thereby render impact on the operational framework of the concern. Secondly the change process must encompass the creation of a Change Leader who in turn is responsible for communicating the change process to the teams and groups pertaining to the different departments. Moreover the change leader is required to form a separate team consisting of experienced, creative and knowledgeable people that would act as innovators working to bring about newer processes for the concern. Thirdly the change to be brought about in the organizational culture can be enhanced by the change leader through the designing or modification of the objectives listed relating to the mission and vision guidelines. The vision and mission elements must be changed by the change leader focusing on the external and internal changes thereby enhancing the organizational feasibility to counter external competition. Fourthly the change leader or manager must endeavor such classes of people in the concern that act as ‘early adopters’ and thereby tend to help in the incorporation of large scale innovation and creativity in the organizational work processes. These people must be rightly identified by the change manager such that they can be put into separate experiments or pilot projects where they can work to deliver separate set of effective recommendations for the concern. In turn these set of recommendations rendered by the different target groups of innovators helps in rightly enhancing the change process in the concern. The change leader must focus on dividing the entire change process into stipulated time periods. Depending on the different time periods the change leader must endeavor to experiment the effect of the changes brought about on the concern. This type of a task designed by the change leader helps in understanding in whether the change process initiated would help in enhancing the organizational potency and competitiveness in the long run. Further if the test conducted signifies a success it would also help in motivating other people in the concern to join the bandwagon of innovators and creators in the concern (Crawley, Malmqvist and Ostlund 168-173). The above listed strategies can be incorporated by the organizational manager to help in bringing about a newer organizational culture and design that would help in fostering creativity and innovation. References Bashshur, Rashid L., Reardon, Timothy, G., and Shannon, Gary, W. “TELEMEDICINE: A New Health Care Delivery System”. Annual Review Public Health. 2000. Volume 21, pp.613–37. Blackwell, Gordon. “The future of IT in healthcare”. Informatics for Health & Social Care. Brear, Michelle. “Evaluating telemedicine: lessons and challenges”. Health Information management Journal. Volume 35 no 2. 2006. Crawley, Edward F., Malmqvist, Johan, and Ostlund, Soren. Rethinking engineering education: the CDIO approach. New York: Springer. 21-Jun-2007. Darkins, Adam William, and Cary, Margaret Ann. Telemedicine and telehealth: principles, policies, performance, and pitfalls, Part 219. New York: Springer Publishing Company. Datamonitor. “CardioNet Inc.” 22nd November, 2011. Datamonitor-a. “Philips Healthcare”. 14th September, 2010. Datamonitor-b. “LifeWatch AG”. 21st November, 2011. December 2008. Volume 33, Issue4, pp. 211–326. Institute of Medicine and Field, Marilyn Jane. Telemedicine: a guide to assessing telecommunications in health care. Washington, D.C.: National Academies. 15-Jun-1996. Lazakidou, Athina. Web-Based Applications in Healthcare and Biomedicine. New York: Springer, 13-Nov-2009. Mun, Seong K., and Turner, Jeanine W. “Telemedicine: Emerging e-medicine”. Annual Review of Biomedical Engineering, 1999. Vol. 1 Issue 1, pp.589-610. Sharma, K.P., and Parashar, Poonam. Enterpreneurship. New Delhi: FK Publications, 2011. Stamn, Bettina Von. Managing innovation, design and creativity. United Kingdom: John Wiley and Sons, 2008. Stanberry, B. “Telemedicine: barriers and opportunities in the 21st century”. Journal of Internal Medicine. 2000. Volume 247, pp.615-628. Read More