Effective Communication

Effective Communication Paper

Jaiyash Autar

HCS/325

01/22/13
Michael Bell

Effective Communication

In today’s health care organizations there are different variety of structures and forms to achieve a greater improved patient care, productivity and goals. Each health care organization follows different organizational structures or models. Some common or traditional organizational structures are functional, divisional, and matrix structures and some nontraditional structures are teams, networks, and boundaryless organizations. All health care organization has a mixture of traditional, nontraditional, and new organizational model structures. This paper discusses how Lodi memorial hospital (LMH) is a matrix, team approach organizational model. This paper also discusses how LMH shares knowledge and how to formulate solutions to solve problems. This paper also addresses how effective and non-effective communication techniques are used for sharing information and ideas, how communication techniques might be applied or modifies in health care work environment, and how technology might also affect this process.

Lodi memorial hospital is a matrix organizational model in a sense that combines both functional and divisional structures. This allows the organization to combine the advantages of each structure and minimize the disadvantages. The advantages of the matrix structures is that it allows more cooperation, better customer service, improved problem-solving and improved strategic management. But there always disadvantages of this models. Some of the disadvantages are power struggles, priority confusion, tunnel vision and expense. Lodi memorial hospital has a great team structure. The team approach structure allows Lodi memorial hospital to share information effectively, improve problem-solving and create relations to improve performance and customer service.

Lodi memorial hospital has many communication techniques of sharing information and ideas within the organization. The most effective ways of communication to share knowledge and ideas in LMH is through emails, phone, meetings, cross training and fax. Using emails and phone calls to share information is effective because there is less miscommunication and allows more accurate information to be shared on a personal and professional level. Staff meetings allow employees to engage in discussions with management on department issues and how to resolve them within the department. In addition, managers are able to discuss statistical information on how the department is doing. Staff meetings are effective to discuss with the employees on how to achieve the organizations visions and goals. Managers and supervision can use staff meetings to share information about new products, policies and tasks that need to be carried out by each employee on a daily basis. Having staff meetings enables employees to share their ideas and expertise to find solutions for certain issues in the department or within the organization. Faxing is a good communication method to share information from clinics to hospital or inter-department because it allows information to be sent accurately and quickly to be processed and acknowledged.

Another, effective technique used for sharing knowledge or information within LMH is cross training. The need to promote cross training of employees provides a variety of managerial or technical skills and knowledge when implemented horizontally, upward, and downward (Belilos, 1999).” Employees are able to look at the organization as a whole rather than as a department. In addition, cross training allows the employee to see the organization in the works and understand how departments work together to ensure the growth of the organization. This allows the employee to still hold his or her position but cross train in another position or department to gain knowledge and different communication skills, so that their performance increases and makes them more flexible to adapt to different situations.

The most ineffective way of sharing information and ideas within Lodi Memorial Hospital is emails and face-to-face communication. Using emails to share information is ineffective because individuals tend to overlook important information in that email and sometimes ignore the information. In LMH, department directors and supervisors receive a lot of emails on a daily basis and some of the emails they receive are lost in translation. When emails are received sometimes the information is not shared with the rest of the department and organization. In my point of view, emails are lengthy, time consuming and important information are lost. Face-to-Face communication is ineffective because the information and idea is shared with only one particular individual and it’s up to that individual to relay that information to the rest of the employees. About 90 percent of the time that information that has been given to other employees is inaccurate. Emails and face-to-face communication are ineffective methods of problem-solving methods. Using emails to solve problems is time consuming and allow the individual to avoid the problem instead of finding the solution.

In Lodi memorial Hospital technology has great impact on the organization. An electronic Medical record is a new technology that has been implemented in LMH. This technology allows all the employees, doctors, nurses and health care professions to share universal information together. Doctors and nurses using EMR can view the information and allows them to share information with other health care professionals with the organization, for example cardiologists and radiologists. Technology has a negative impact with e-mail communication because using this type of technology can limit an individual in using proper English and grammar and enables miscommunication. Another technology that has impacted LMH is the use of “Meditech”. “Meditech is software that’s designed to capture, store, and display administrative and clinical data used within a hospital, health system, or medical practice (Simplicio, 2008).” Meditech allows sharing information about the patient and updated or correct the information instantly without any delay of communication.

In conclusion, this paper discussed how Lodi Memorial Hospital is a matrix, team approach organizational model. This paper also discusses how LMH shares knowledge and how to formulate solutions to solve problems. This paper also addresses how effective and non-effective communication techniques are used for sharing information and ideas, how communication techniques might be applied or modifies in health care work environment, and how technology might also affect this process.

References

Belilos, C. (1999). Cross-Training as a motivational and problem-solving Technique. Retrieved from http://www.easytraining.com/crosstrain.htm

Simplicio, R. (2008, Apirl 16). What is this meditech thing, anyway?. Retrieved from http://simplicio.com/meditech/what-is-this-meditech-thing-anyway

Lombardi, D., Schermerhorn, J., & Kramer, B. (2007). Healthcare Management (4th ed.). Phoenix, AR: John Wiley & Sons Inc.

References: Belilos, C. (1999). Cross-Training as a motivational and problem-solving Technique. Retrieved from http://www.easytraining.com/crosstrain.htm Simplicio, R. (2008, Apirl 16). What is this meditech thing, anyway?. Retrieved from http://simplicio.com/meditech/what-is-this-meditech-thing-anyway Lombardi, D., Schermerhorn, J., & Kramer, B. (2007). Healthcare Management (4th ed.). Phoenix, AR: John Wiley & Sons Inc.