Implementing a Strategic Plan
Analytical Tool Used In Determining the Success of the Organization
Strategic analysis can be defined as the process of carrying out research studies on an organization or business or the entire organization’s environmental setting in order to determine the success of the organization or devise relevant strategies that will ensure the organization’s success. There are a variety of strategies that can be used in the determination of the success of an organization. The strategies include SWOT analysis, four corner’s analysis, early warning scans, PEST analysis, value chain analysis, Porter’s five forces analysis, and gaming analysis. However, based on the contest of our organization, we chose to employ the SWOT analysis technique in the determination of the effectiveness of the adaptive strategies of the organization. A SWOT analysis is an analytical technique that is used in the comprehension of the weaknesses, strengths, threats, and opportunities that are involved in an organization. The technique commences by defining the organizational objectives and the identification of the external and internal aspects that are significant in the realization of the objectives. According to the analysis, the internal aspects may include issues such as weaknesses and strengths, whereas threats and opportunities are categorized as external factors (Wijngaarden et al., 2010).
The adaptive strategies undertaken by our organization include offering additional training to the staff members and setting up of a training team that is instrumental in training volunteers in healthcare. Additionally, the organization ensures that it recruits staff members who have excellent interpersonal skills so as to be able to relate well with our clients. A SWOT analysis of the above mentioned strategies involves a study of both the internal and extern factors that are essential in ensuring that the strategies lead to the success of the healthcare organization. The strengths of the organization comprise of highly trained staff members possessing excellent interpersonal skills. A SWOT analysis would include interviews with every staff member of the organization in order to verify if they possess good interpersonal skills and are knowledgeable about their profession as dictated by the organization’s standards. The interviews will be conducted by a qualified private and independent organization to eliminate any form of bias or favoritism. After the interviews, the interviewing body will meet with the organization’s management and inform them about their findings. Since the analysis mainly dwells on the strengths and weakness of the organization, the findings will be useful in the determination of our staff weaknesses; thereby, enabling us to resolve them. As a result, our organization will be stirred towards success. Moreover, the analysis also tackles external factors that would affect an organization. A SWOT analysis of the external aspects affecting our organization would involve a study of the manner in which our training team conducts its training activities. The training mainly involves volunteers and other willing community members. The study would involve a thorough investigation of the training procedure and measures followed when recruiting the successful trainees to be part of our team. A transparent training and recruitment procedure would make our organization trustworthy to the community; thereby, making them gain faith in the quality of our services. Therefore, the chances of our organization being successful would be high.
Internal and External Barriers to the Success of the Organization
The success of our healthcare organization is highly dependent on the quality of services offered by our staff, the effectiveness of our staff in offering their services, the manner in which our staff interacts with our clients, and the outcomes from the training activities carried out by our training team. If the outcomes are positive, then the chances of our organization attaining success are high. The internal barriers that would reduce the chances of our organization achieving success would include factors such as poor interpersonal skills among our staff members and provision of low quality services. The barrier would arise from the organization hiring lowly qualified staff members who do not have adequate knowledge in the medical profession. Such staff members would provide low quality services to our clients; thus, driving them away from our organization. However, our organization acknowledges that newly hired staff and existing staff require additional knowledge concerning healthcare because of the rapidly changing technological universe. As a result, we have established a training center having a highly qualified training team that is ever conducting research activities and training our staff on new and better methods of offering healthcare services. Additionally, our organization embraces change and is equipped with recent and better healthcare facilities that enable our staff to provide high quality services to our patients. In order to ensure that our staff possesses good interpersonal skills, our organization frequently evaluates them regarding the skills and their interaction with the patients and other clients. Additionally, we have a suggestion and recommendation box where we encourage our staff to drop their views on the services that they receive in our organization. Any complaints that arise are resolved immediately. However, frequently complaints concerning a certain department or staff member always cause a reshuffle in the concerned department. Therefore, ensuring that our staff provide high quality services and possess good interpersonal skills would facilitate the success of our organization (Tsai et al., 2011).
In addition, the external barrier that could prevent our organization from attaining success could involve poor training and biased recruitment of trainees to be part of our team by the training team. In order to earn the trust of our clients, we must show them that we are a highly qualified and transparent organization. Therefore, our training team should be able to provide high quality training to the willing community members and conduct their recruitment procedures in a transparent manner. As a result, the community at large will deem us as a trustworthy and reliable organization; thereby, seeking our services anytime they need them. As a result, our organization will be stirred towards attaining success (Tsai et al., 2011).
Target Market for Our Organization
Our organization is a healthcare organization that offers healthcare services to all patients from all the social classes and regions of the country. We are not limited to offering our services to any specific group of individuals or individuals from a specific region of the country. We offer our services to basically all runs of people ranging from the children, adults, rich, poor, expectant, and disabled. Our organization comprises of several departments that address almost all forms of illnesses. Each department is headed by a highly qualified medical practitioner, who oversees the roles performed by his or her junior staff. We offer our services at affordable rates in order to cater for the needs of the people from the lower social status. We have a separate section for the expectant mothers, the children, and the infants. We also have an Intensive Care Unit (ICU) that handles critical conditions and an emergency section for handling emergencies. We treat most of the common diseases in our country and any form of emergency arising from accidents, fire outbreaks, and other catastrophes. Recently, we implanted a section for the treatment of cancer. However, we do not handle critical conditions involving cancer; however, we work hand in hand with other hospitals concerning the treatment of cancer and we often transfer such patient to other hospitals with sophisticated cancer treatment equipments. Nevertheless, we are dedicated to ensuring that we fully equip our organization with all the necessary facilities for the treatment of cancer in the next two years. Regarding our first aid training services, our training team often targets individuals interested in first aid and the successful ones are usually recruited to be part of our first aid team.
Effective Approaches in Marketing Our Organizational Strategies
In order to effectively market the adaptive strategies of our organization, we often ensure the efficiency of our pre-service, point-of-service, and after-service activities. The pre-service activities comprise of the manner we handle our clients and patients before the healthcare practitioners offer them the services that they require. The manner in which a patient is handled before, during, and after treatment is very instrumental in determining whether he or she will come back to the healthcare facility the next time he or she requires the services. Moreover, the same patient might have a sick relative or friend and whether he or she will recommend the patient to come for treatment to your organization would depend on how you handled him or her. Therefore, to market our services, we offer excellent pre-service, point-of-service, and after-service activities to our clients. We have clean, well-organized, and entertaining waiting rooms for the outpatients at all our departments where our patients wait for their turn to be treated. Additionally, we have jovial attendants at every department who direct the patients. Emergency cases are dealt with immediately at the emergency section. For those patients who require admission, we have large, attractive, and clean wards where the patients stay. During the provision of services, our practitioners are always kind to the patients and often offer quick and quality services to all our patients. Our after-service activities often include counseling services to the distressed patients. The above mentioned services are an effective approach in marketing the services of the organization since the patients will feel treasured and appreciated. As a result, they will continue visiting the organization anytime they require healthcare services. Moreover, the patients will also recommend the organization to their relatives and friends; thereby, facilitating the success of the organization.
How Our Organization Can Support Its Strategic Direction within Its Culture and Structure
In order for our organization to support its strategic direction within its culture and structure, it should create strategic plans that will be instrumental in ensuring that the organization achieves its specific strategic direction. The management of the organization must converge and assess, discuss, test, and consent on the specific strategic direction and the plans that will ensure that the strategic direction is attained. To be able to come up with the best plans, the management team may utilize analytical tools such as the SWOT analysis in assessing the viability of their proposed plans. The plan may include the determination of the weaknesses, strengths, threats, and opportunities that are involved in the organization and suggesting possible ways of resolving them. Additionally, the management may restate the organization’s mission, vision, values, and objectives of the organization in order to make them more compelling in addressing their specific direction so as to enable them to achieve it. For an organization to achieve its specific strategic direction, the management should possess proper leadership skills so that they can generate viable strategic plans. Therefore, to support the strategic direction of the organization, the management should generate proper strategic plans (Harris, 1999).
Strategic resources and their significance in stirring the organization towards attaining its strategic goals
Finance
Finance can be defined as the monetary input into an organization that will facilitate the day-to-day activities of the organization. Our organization requires finances for it to operate efficiently. For instance, efficient operation of organizations will entail the purchase of the necessary equipment, compensations to the organization’s personnel, purchase of the necessary pharmaceutical products and devices, construction of the necessary facilities, among others (Crook et al., 2008). Therefore, with adequate financial resources, it is possible for the organization to achieve its specific strategic goals because its operation will be efficient, quality, and timely.
Human Resources
Human resources are the personnel who are instrumental in carrying out the daily activities offered by the organization. These are the people who ensure the success of the organization because they are the ones who interact with the patients and other clients on a daily basis. The success of the organization depends on the quality of the services that are provided by the personnel, their efficiency in offering the services, and the manner in which they interact with the people to whom they offer the services (Crook et al., 2008). A high qualified human resource team will imply that the services provided are excellent; thereby, enabling the organization to achieve its strategic goals.
Facilities
The organization’s facilities are the necessary equipments that are used in the provision of healthcare services. The facilities will determine the quality of the services that are provided by the organization. Better and up-to-date facilities will imply that the services provided are of high quality. Additionally, better facilities will imply that the organization can handle critical conditions that may arise. Therefore, the type of facilities of an organization will determine whether an organization achieves its specific strategic goals or not (Crook et al., 2008). If the organization invests in better and sophisticated facilities, it will easily achieve its strategic goals because of the quality of the services that they offer.
Information Technology
Currently, information technology is a factor that is in play at every level of the organization. An efficiently operating organization is that which has an effective communication channel among all the personnel and the relevant clients. A good communication channel will imply that the flow of information is efficient; therefore, confusions or misunderstandings will be minimized. Additionally, information technology will enable the organization to be at pace with the changing technological universe; thereby, enabling the organization to embrace change (Crook et al., 2008). Therefore, if an organization has a well-developed information technology system, it will have high chances of attaining its strategic goals.
How the Strategic Plan Aligns with the Organization’s Mission and Vision
The mission and vision of the organization are targeted to the provision of quality services to all our clients at affordable rates in order to achieve the specific goals. Therefore, our strategic plans are work hand in hand to ensure that the goals are achievable. The strategic plans are evaluate the methods that the organization’s management should implement in order to ensure that the goals are achieved. Additionally, the strategic direction of the organization is dependent on the strategic plans, mission, and vision of the organization.
References
Crook, T. R., Jr, K. D., Combs, J. G., & Todd, S. Y. (2008). Strategic Resources and Performance: a Meta-analysis. Strategic Management Journal.
Harris, L. (1999). "Initiating Planning: The Problem of Entrenched Cultural Values." Long Range Planning 32, no. 1.
Tsai, W., Shaw, M. J., Fan, Y., Liu, J., Lee, K., & Chen, H. (2011). An empirical investigation of the impacts of internal/external facilitators on the project success of ERP: A structural equation model. Decision Support Systems.
Wijngaarden, J. D., Scholten, G. R., & Wijk, K. P. (2010). Strategic analysis for health care organizations: the suitability of the SWOT-analysis. International Journal of Health Planning and Management.