HRM Assignment: Implementation Of Human Resource Strategy By Lambda Health

Question

Task: HRM AssignmentTask Requirements:
Individually, research and write an analytical discussion paper that uses relevant human resource management theory, models, empirical research evidence and other authoritative sources, based on the following scenario: You are the newly appointed HR Director in a hospital services provider named ‘Lambda Health’, operating in Sydney and Melbourne, Australia. Lambda Health is a for-profit company, providing a range of private hospital services, specialising in day surgery and short-stay recovery. The company has a good reputation for the quality of its medical care and operates with a strict code of ethical practice. Lamba Health currently has one facility in Sydney and one in Melbourne of similar size and employs a total of 150 professional staff – doctors, nurses and allied health (70% female), plus around 110 support and administration staff (85% female).

The COVID-19 pandemic has caused some disruptions to health services in the past two years which has led to a reduction in ROI and a decline in profits. Also, around 5% of staff have refused to comply with the NSW and Victoria state government vaccination mandates and their contracts have been terminated. You have been made aware that turnover of professional staff is around 15% and 20% for support staff. Although qualified staff are available to be recruited from the public sector hospitals, the turnover disruption has caused some internal cultural issues and placed a heavy demand on the provision of adequate training.

The CEO and Board are looking forward to your written discussion paper on future HR strategy for the organisation, based on your research and understanding of HR theory and models. The Board have announced that its business strategy for the next three years is: (1) to expand the facilities over the next three years to increase capacity by 20%; (2) to continue to provide quality health care services; and (3) to improve return-on-investment back to 2019 levels.

Currently, there is a central HR function of five people based in Melbourne and two local HR Business Partners in Sydney. Payroll services and compliance training services are provided by external agencies. The main focus of HR is on staffing, performance and capability development. In discussions with your new HR team, the HR team have raised the following issues with you:

1. Capability status: The high turnover is impacting the capability levels of some of the professional areas which has meant that more training has been required to be delivered by competent professionals to new staff. This directly impacts the number of patients that can be seen by these professionals with a resulting loss of income to Lambda Health.

2. Work flexibility: A large portion of the workforce are female, with 30 of those staff on parental leave. Another 3 males are also on parental leave. The HR team have identified that part-time and flexible working hours are critical concerns for many staff.

Growth strategy: The Board’s growth strategy needs to be seen in relation to stabilising turnover and ensuring that the risk factors behind it are mitigated.

In your discussion paper about HR strategy, please use some of these issues as examples of how an integrated HR-business strategy would help move the company forward in its business strategy.

In writing this discussion paper we would expect you to refer to a minimum of 10 academic journal articles and/or relevant reference textbooks.

Answer

Introduction to HRM Assignment
The business environment has become very competitive. Organizations are constantly focusing on productivity within the firm because effective production helps firm to gain competitive advantage and also helps in increasing the share within the market. The productivity of an organization is directly correlated with the employee productivity.HR team of a firm helps in enhancing the productivity of employees in the workplace. HRM team helps in developing skills of the employees, reduce stress and also enhances the positive vibe of the workplace (Tahir, Yousafzai, Jan and Hashim, 2014). The aim of this report is to discuss about several challenges faced by a hospital named Lambda health due to the covid-19 pandemic. The report also aims at discussing integrated HR strategy required for overcoming relevant challenges within the workplace.

Case overview
The case mainly deals with an organization named Lambda Health. This healthcare firm is known for providing several healthcare services to the patients. The pandemic has impacted the growth and actions of Lambda health. The turnover rate of the professionals within the firm has increased. The Return on Investment of the hospital has decreased. These major disruptions might affect the firm on a long-term basis. The objective of the following part of the report is to discuss integrated HR strategies that can further help the firm to overcome challenges that they are constantly facing.

Integrated HR strategies
There are several strategies followed by the HR team of the organization. The objective of these HR strategies is to develop the skills and abilities of the employees within the firm so that they can help the firm achieve organizational goals and objectives significantly. Furthermore, in this pandemic, organizations in various parts of the world are constantly incurring loss. This is leading to decrease in competitive advantage and organizations are losing market share in the global market. HR leaders are often finding it difficult to understand the change in the volatile market. In such scenario, utilization of human capital efficiently is of utmost importance. This can be done with the help of integrated marketing strategies.

Workforce planning
When right person is recruited at the right moment and at the right job it is known as workforce planning. When organizations face challenges and hurdles, they tend to optimize productivity and reduce costs. In such scenario, effective workforce planning is required. Efficient HR managers aim at forming heterogeneous set of employees within the workplace because they are capable of taking relevant business decisions and solve problem effectively (De Bruecker, Van den Bergh, Beliën and Demeulemeester, 2015). In case of Lambda health effective workforce planning is also important. Lambda health is witnessing a high rate of employee turnover. Thus, retaining employees is the core aspect of workforce planning. Retention of employees should be done successfully because it helps in the stability and growth of the organization (Cloutier, Felusiak, Hill and Pemberton-Jones, 2015). Retention of employees by Lambda Health can be done by fostering a work environment which is positive in nature.

In addition to this, the pandemic has led to termination of employees of several firms across the world. This has decreased the morale of the employees. Low morale of employees can be one of the major reasons behind decrease in productivity within the hospital. Thus, it is the core responsibilities of the HR team of the organization to enhance the morale employees by ensuring awareness within the workplace.

Furthermore, training and development of employees is also considered to be another important aspect of workforce planning. It is termed as one of the indispensable tools that further enhances the productivity of the organization. The primary step of effective training and development programme is identification of the training needs (Falola, Osibanjo and Ojo, 2014). If the case of Lambda health is taken into consideration then it can be seen that professionals within the firm are not trained enough. Thus, the HR managers should make sure that professional training is provided to the staffs. Due to the pandemic the business environment has become very volatile and market conditions are constantly changing. Thus, corporate trainers should make sure that the change in the market conditions are informed properly to the employees of the organization. Effective training will not only increase awareness among the employees but it will also have an impact on the confidence and the productivity of the organization. Moreover, the capability status of the organization will also increase. This means the firm’s ability to enhance competent professionals within the organization will also increase.

Managing work arrangements that are flexible
When employers give employees full liberty to choose their time of working it is known as work flexibility. Work flexibility is mostly undertaken to satisfy employees within the workplace and it is only possible when there is organizational support (Ma, 2018). If the case is taken into consideration, then it can be found that almost 70% of the employees of this hospital are women and most of them are on parental leave. Apart from that few male employees are also on parental leave. Absence of employees during the working hours is decreasing the productivity of the organization and is also causing major disruptions within the society. Thus, in such case it is the responsibility of the HR team of the organization to focus on managing the work arrangements.

Employees who are on parental leave and are a part of the administrative team should be provided with work from home opportunities. Work from home opportunities can help them work in the comfort of their house and it can also enhance the productivity of the hospital. During the pandemic, the generation of revenue has reduced. Thus, effective and proper recruitment of employees can help the hospital overcome this financial issue. The senior HR leaders should focus on assisting the employers so that the recruiting strategies are modified and the efforts made on recruitment is effective. The workers within the workplace should also be empowered so that their work/life balance is maintained. Grievances among the workers should be reduced with the help of well-defined strategies. This can enhance the flexibility as well as transparency within the workplace.

In addition to this, another major strategy that can be adopted to manage the flexible work arrangements is shifting working time. Time of work can be allocated to each and every department of the hospital. Shifting duty can help the firm to focus on production on a whole-day basis (SHRM, 2021). Finally, working parents during the time of pandemic can be supported by initiating employee shifts, rotating days either in a week or in a day. Employees can also return to work with simple working schedules. This approach or strategies adopted by the HR team of the organization will not only enhance the satisfaction level of the employees but it will also enhance the productivity of the firm.

Performance and Development
Employee performance is marked as one of the important aspects of organization because it is directly correlated with the performance of the organization. Employee performance can also be termed as financial as well as non-financial outcomes of the employees (Fithriana and Adi, 2017). Thus, organizational leaders tend to enhance the performance of the employees in the workplace. If the case is taken into consideration it can be seen that the ROI of Lambda Health has decreased to a significant level. Thus, the primary responsibility of the HR leaders of the firm is to identify reasons that are causing low performance. There are many employees who are often aware of their performance and the reason behind degradation of their performance. Despite, having required awareness they often fail to communicate their problems with other members of the organization. In such cases, the senior leaders of HR team should focus on understanding the need of the employees. Effective communication can solve this problem. Constant interaction between the HR leaders and other employees of the organization regarding organizational activities is important. Constant interaction will help the HR leaders understand the reason behind employee incompetency. This approach will not only enhance the productivity of the organization but will also help in development of the skills and abilities of employees.

Apart from understanding the reason behind degradation in the performance of the organization, managing performance within Lambda Health is also important. Performance management is termed as a management tool which helps in creating a workplace where members of the organization can perform by leveraging,they’reeach and every skill. Performance within the workplace can be managed with the help of relevant performance management techniques. These techniques have an impact on the performance measurement and other management practices within the workplace (Bititci, Cocca and Ates, 2016). 360-degree performance appraisal technique can be adopted by the HR team of Lambda Health. According to this technique employees within the hospital will be provided with proper feedback. The feedback can help the employees understand their performance progress and how they can further improve the level of performance within the hospital. Along with this feedback from employees should also be collected by the HR managers of the organization. The feedback from the employees can be used for understanding the mental state of the employees. If there are any grievances among the employees then it can be taken care of by the senior HR department of Lambda Health.

In addition to this, employee development is also an important aspect of the integrated HR strategy. When employee and employer take a joint initiative to upgrade or develop skills and abilities of the employees within the firm it is known as employee development. According to the transformational leadership theory, employees within an organization can be motivated and inspired and their skills can also be developed with the help of empowerment. Transformational leaders also have the ability to understand the condition of the market and this further helps them to initiate change within the workplace. The skills and knowledge of the employees are developed along with the need and change of the market. Thus, from the analysis it can be understood that transformational leaders can help in employee development. In this competitive business environment, huge amount of money is being invested by organizations to focus on employee development and help the firm gain competitive advantage (Hameed and Waheed, 2011). The pandemic has a negative impact on the financial and the non-financial performance of Lambda Health. Thus, the employees within the firm should be mentored efficiently so that they can develop advanced skills. The current business scenario is challenging therefore, advanced skill within the employees can help the hospital overcome several issues. Currently, effective training can be provided with the help of e-learning courses. Employees can attend training sessions through online. The primary objective of the training session is to inform them about the current trends in the market.

Diversity management
Organizations currently hire employees from different cultural and linguistic background. To avoid any kind of cultural conflicts within the workplace, HR leaders often initiate diversity and inclusive strategies within the workplace. Increase in demographic diversity has given rise to the need of the diversity management (Lauring, 2013). There is no exception in case of Lambda Health. From the case study it can be found that cultural issues faced by the employees of the organization have also resulted in the increase in turnover rate of employees within the organization. In such scenario, the senior leaders of the organization should focus on adopting diversity management strategies. The primary activity that ensures diversity management within the core activities of the organization is conducting diversity training. Diversity training is marked as a set of programs that aims at ensuring positive inter-group relationship. The training also aims at enhancing skills among the employees within the organization so that they can prevent themselves from practicing discriminatory activities within the workplace (Alhejji, et.al., 2016). Since, the turnover rate of employees within the hospital is increasing therefore, the senior leaders of the organization should make sure to recruit employees from different diverse backgrounds. Once, employees from different diverse groups are recruited by the senior HR leaders of the organization then the organizational members should make sure to initiate diversity policies. The diversity policies and procedures should be formulated in such a way so that every employee practice inclusiveness within the workplace. The policies should be formulated in such a way so that people who belong to different cultural backgrounds are not excluded from the core activities of the organization.

Staffing
This is also an integrated HR strategy that helps the organizational leader get the right worker for the organization. Staffing in the healthcare sector decreases the patient mortality and also have a positive impact on the healthcare outcomes (Trinkoff, et.al., 2011). It is highly recommended to the senior HR leaders of the Lambda Health to focus on recruiting eligible and skilled staffs within the workplace. In the current pandemic situation, staffs who are well-aware of covid protocols should be hired. They can guide the patients and other members of the organization in a significant way. To hire skilled and eligible employees within the workplace, manpower planning is of utmost importance. The exact requirement of manpower should be identified. Once, the need of the manpower is identified then it can make the recruitment process smooth and simple.

In addition to this, workforce orientation is also an important part of staffing. Orientation of employees that is related to the roles and responsibilities within the workplace is known as workforce orientation (Ninan, Roy and Thomas, 2019). In Lambda Health systematic planning and allocation of roles and responsibilities of employees should be done. This will not only make the process of production simple but it will also enhance workforce productivity. Furthermore, workforce orientation can optimize the productivity of the hospital amidst this pandemic. Workforce orientation also helps in systematic distribution of work among various employees within the workplace. This prevents confusion and dissatisfaction among any employees in the workplace.

Conclusion
The main aim of this report is to discuss integrated marketing strategy that can help an organization named Lambda Health overcome challenges that are faced amidst this pandemic. The report concludes that hiring right number of employees and training them effectively is important. This approach will not only help the firm overcome challenges but it will also help the organization grow significantly in the global market. The HR team of this hospital should focus on effective workforce planning, recruitment of employees, performance development and management of employees. All these initiatives within the workplace will not help the firm grow but will also enhance the positive behaviours and attitudes of employees in the organization. This will reduce wastage of time and money of the organization and the required skills of the employees can be leveraged with the help of the above discussed topic. Finally, it can be said that the above discussed integrated marketing strategies are important because it can help the firm overcome covid-19 pandemic.

ReferenceList
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