Healthcare and Strategic Planning

Healthcare and Strategic Planning

HLTH310-1204B-01

Abstract

This paper is written in an attempt to describe a healthcare organization's service strategy, which will include strategies on how to create a healing environment within the organization, which will affect patients, visitors, and employees.

It will also touch upon some qualities of customer service and how important these are to an organization. Once the company has achieved these goals they have to maintain them and need to continually instruct their staff members regarding the maintenance and the mission which is all about customer service. This culture needs the feedback and the support of customers, staff members, and visitors in order to continue its growth, retain its customers and obtain referrals for new customers.

Managers and leaders must be just that, people who manage and lead others in the culture of the organization. They also need to incorporate the six pillars of excellence that all organizations need to strive for, achieve and maintain. Each of these qualities is equally as important as the other. The first three of these are quality, service and people. If the company provides quality healthcare with wonderful service and the staff is congenial and seemingly happy, it creates a desirable tone for that patient's healthcare experience. Three other qualities include finance, growth and community. Finance obviously is to make money while still continuing to administer great customer service in order to grow the company and become a valuable asset to the community. When all of these needs are met, the company's reputation as a great facility will become very well known.

The Human Resources department will be the first contact point for the newly hired employee and training begins at this point. They should stipulate the importance of customer service when placing the ads; then again during the interviewing process and yet again during orientation and training. The employee has now been indoctrinated and it's up to the managers to continue the reinforcement by rewarding them when they've gone above and beyond their normal duties.

Customers expect comfort in the setting they are visiting. When a facility is crowded it tends to make people feel as though the organization doesn't care about their privacy, individuality, or self-respect. Some other features to allay the customers' fears may include the layout of the facility, the size, and the distance they have to maneuver to get to the facility. The ease of accessibility to the facility along with the furnishings can make a lot of difference to the customer. The space should be safe, and easy for services to be provided, designed to easily find the different areas of the facility (usually by good placement of signage).

Most successful healthcare organizations glean information from the customers and their employees and transform that useful information to create a healthy servicescape in order to provide a wonderful environment for the patient, their family members and the staff. The servicescape is the total summation of the patient's impression of the healthcare facility and experience in general. A patients' impression of the facility and the staff are formed by four environmental dimensions such as ambience, space and layout of facility, signage and symbols that can be understood universally, as well as other people's opinions. Each customer's encounter regarding their healthcare experience is different and since there are no two patients alike, every customer has an observation based on their background and what they are accustomed to. Biological, judgment, and sensitivity are three types of responses that patients use to form their opinion of the healthcare facility and what they've undergone while visiting. Two choices will be made by the customer at the time of their visit, which will be either to continue to visit or find another healthcare provider that will provide the type of service they prefer, this is in spite of the clinical services being delivered, since this decision is based solely on their reaction to the environment. Servicescape responses affect the customers' satisfaction resulting in repeat visits, employee retention, and word of mouth referrals. In order to convey to their customers that their