Performance of ABC Hospital - Essay Example

ABC Hospital (Recruitment paper) Literature review Literature review The US healthcare industry is in an accelerated pace in terms of growth, but the industry, unfortunately, is facing an acute shortage of nurses. The major reason for the shortage is the lack of suitable persons who are prepared to the actual commitment the job demands apart from the competitive nature of the career requirements. The demand for registered and experienced nurses keeps escalating and the healthcare industry is not able to cope up with the situation by finding suitable candidates due to a dry spell that they experience due to a variety of reasons. The gap between course completion and job placement is far too less than the job responsibility envisages. Therefore, recruitment of nurses has become a tedious activity. ABC hospital is experiencing a similar situation where it is in shortage of nurses. So the company needs to employ a better strategy for the recruitment and retention of the nurses in their hospital. Recruitment method: Registered nurses are available not only from the US but also from other countries. The first strategy should be taken up is to rely on recruitment agencies. It should open up direct offices in those countries where a great pool of prospective registered nurses are available. The office can be for short term or long term depending upon the requirements. ABC should portray a better picture about them through their agencies. Otherwise there are chances for the prospective candidates to choose another organization. The recruited nurses and already working nurses can be used as referrals. They may be asked to refer to whom they knows. In this way more and more pool of candidates can be made available. The nurses may be remunerated in a reasonable amount for referring the candidates. "Ask your top nurses individually to increase their referrals (give them a target of five a month). Ask them to refer their "mentees," friends, and former colleagues." (Sullivan, 2001). Retention of Nurses: Retention of nurses is one of the issues faced by the hospital. The process of retention is more complex than recruitment. Since there are sufficient opportunities for registered nurses in the job market they don't mind quitting from an organization. Timely redressing of grievances is the primary strategy to be employed by the hospital to retain the nurses. "It's a complex process, requiring in-depth knowledge of the needs and wants of the nursing staff and lots of creativity. "You have to know what motivates nurses to stay," says Pamela Thompson, CEO of the American Organization of Nurse Executives." (Runy, 2001). Therefore, the management should first of all identify what the requirements of the nurses are. Proper examination of the working conditions must be done by the management. The HR management of ABC must try to maintain a personal relationship with the nurse's inorder to learn them in detail. Such an interaction will help the nurses to express their grievances before the management. In short a free and two way communication chains must be fostered in the organization. Providing a better learning environment is one of the factors that the nurses expect. Providing new certificates for specialized practices will make the nurses self motivated. Most of the personal factors affect the nurses at the work place. So, the management should assist them in solving their personal matters. This will provide a homely atmosphere for them. The nurses must be imparted a feeling that they are a very important compound for the success of the hospital. The role that every nurse should perform must be clearly defined. After all what affects most in the retention is the proper remuneration. Sufficient incentives along with the fixed remuneration will motivate the nurses to stay with the organization they work. Efficient nurses and the one who have been with the organization for quite a long time should be promoted with more responsibilities. Decreasing turnover: Employee turnover refers to the phenomenon of the nurses coming and leaving the organization in a very short period. Techniques for decreasing the turnover and methods for retaining the nurses are similar terms. Proper employment of the methods to retain the nurses will reduce the employee turnover in the hospital. One of the major factors that increase the rate of employee turnover is the better salary package offered by the competing organizations. In order to stop the happening of this the company should provide necessary incentives along with the salary. This remuneration can be fixed by comparing the performance level of all the nurses. Providing better working environment will motivate the employees to stay with their organization. The workload provided must be bearable by them. A safer working environment is another expectation of nurses. Safer working environment is the preference by the nurses than remuneration. Introducing better employee insurance scheme will protect the nurses against many risks. Incentive, reward and recognition program Proper incentive, reward and recognition program is very essential for the retaining of nurses in the hospitals. Since there is very high competition in the industry for grabbing health care employees the companies are offering very high salary packages for the employees. This trend has made the industry a very high employee turnover sector. ABC should employ a very good and attractive incentive plan for retaining their employees. There are many financial and non financial aids for helping the organization retain their employees. Incentives include those payments other than the basic salary paid to the nurses. This can be monetary and non monetary. Monetary incentives can be provided to those nurses who work more than the expected. A standard working hour and work output must be set at first. However it is very hard to set work output for the nurses as their work is mostly qualitative. Therefore, the standard can be set as the number of patients whom they assist in a working day. An extra payment can be made in proportion to the number of extra patients whom they assist. Extra payment for the overtime is another payment that can be made to the nurses as incentive. One of the non monetary incentives that can be provided to the nurses is the free accommodation facility. Free accommodation facility will reduce the house rent burden on the income of nurses. Another incentive that can be provided is the travel allowance. A better incentive plan will make the employees half relieved of their problems. The better incentive plan is closely related to the maintenance of better interpersonal relations in the organization. Providing proper remuneration will assure the nurses about the employee remunerating strategy of the hospital. Thus they will always maintain very good and healthy relations with their superiors. This attitude is in turn spread to the co-employees too. Apart from the incentive programs proper recognition strategy is another method that should be used by the organization to retain the nurses. Recognition program should concentrate not only on the performance of the nurses but also on the overall behavior of the nurses in the organization. This should include the behavior of the employees with the colleagues, patients and superiors. Recognition of the nurses must be made in front of other nurses. This way the nurses gets self motivated. Proper recognition will improve the motivation level of the nurses. An improved motivation level is highly reflected in their performance. The recognition of the employee will help them to attain a positive image among all the employees. Thus they will work more to achieve similar recognition in future. Rewards for the nurses include financial, non financial and psychological. The financial rewards had already been said in the incentives portion. Appreciation of the work by the superiors or the patients is a method of rewarding the nurses. Appreciation of the work helps the nurses to feel good about them. Promoting to higher job is another method of rewarding the nurses. Rewards help to increase the job satisfaction of the nurses. Better rewards will help the employees develop a positive attitude towards their organization. This positive attitude is ultimately reflected in the overall behavior of the nurses in the organization. References Sullivan, John. (2001, August). Article #159 Recruiting Nurses-with no recruiting budget. Top performer referrals. Retrieved November 20, 2007, from http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/GATELY/pp15s159.htm Runy, Lee. Ann. (2001, January 1). Nurse Retention. An Executive's Guide to Keeping One of Your Hospital's Most Valuable Resources. H&HN. Retrieved November 20, 2007, from http://www.hhnmag.com/hhnmag_app/jsp/articledisplay.jspdcrpath=HHNMAG/PubsNewsArticle/data/0601HHN_FEA_Gatefold&domain=HHNMAG Read More