Developing Organizational Policies and Practices Essay Paper
To Prepare:
Review the national healthcare issue/stressor you examined in your Assignment for Module 1, and review the analysis of the healthcare issue/stressor you selected.
Identify and review two evidence-based scholarly resources that focus on proposed policies/practices to apply to your selected healthcare issue/stressor.
Reflect on the feedback you received from your colleagues on your Discussion post regarding competing needs.
The Assignment (4-5 pages):
Developing Organizational Policies and Practices
Add a section to the paper you submitted in Module 1. The new section should address the following:
Identify and describe at least two competing needs impacting your selected healthcare issue/stressor.
Describe a relevant policy or practice in your organization that may influence your selected healthcare issue/stressor.
Critique the policy for ethical considerations, and explain the policy’s strengths and challenges in promoting ethics.
Recommend one or more policy or practice changes designed to balance the competing needs of resources, workers, and patients, while addressing any ethical shortcomings of the existing policies. Be specific and provide examples.
Cite evidence that informs the healthcare issue/stressor and/or the policies, and provide two scholarly resources in support of your policy or practice recommendations.
Developing organizational policies and practices
Identify and describe at least two competing needs impacting your selected healthcare issue/stressor.
The healthcare issue that has been identified as being of concern is involves inadequate training and development opportunities for nurses in the country. The concern is that nurses lack the required skills, knowledge and competencies thereby limiting their professional capacity with regards to service delivery, quality of services, and care outcomes. It is not unusual for the healthcare industry to feel the need to improve the capacity of nurses since this has implications for public health. However, nurses might have competing needs. To be more precise, practicing nurses must balance the needs for their practice in medical facilities with the needs of improving their capabilities through attending education institutions (Sang & Dearholt, 2018). Developing Organizational Policies and Practices Essay Paper Another competing need is how to allocate the scare resources since money can either be spent educating nurses to handle more patients and who would in turn demand higher salaries or spend the money on hiring additional nurses to handle more patients. The identified competing needs arise because of time and resource constraints since the more time spent at work results in less time spent acquiring education for the skills and knowledge, while the more money spent on improving nurses capacity results in less money spent on other activities (Pokorski, 2018).
Describe a relevant policy or practice in your organization that may influence your selected healthcare issue/stressor.
The organization has a mandatory training program as a policy that influences nurses’ training and development. This program is an in-service training model that matches the training programs at the organization with the nurses learning interests and andragogical need. The intention is to ensure that nurses at the facility achieve greater mastery of professional nursing competencies and skills, while also facilitating occupational tasks. The organization perceives the mandatory training program as an investment that directs its success, staff development and internal promotions. In addition, the program is considered an investment for achieving nurse retention and productivity through offer job satisfaction and career development opportunities (Sanwick, Forrest & O’Brien, 2019).
Critique the policy for ethical considerations, and explain the policy’s strengths and challenges in promoting ethics.
The mandatory in-service training program applied by the organization and targeted at nurses represents a substantial financial investment for supporting the continued competence of nurse personnel. The policy offers all the nurse personnel an equal opportunity to attend the training programs that are of interest to them and that would improve their practical skills and competence. To be more precise, the policy necessitates that all nurses attend at least two weeks of training every six months. The training topics are determined by actual needs and are based on consultations between the nurses, facility administrators and other stakeholders. The consultation when selecting the training topics ensures that they are relevant and resources are allocated where required (Gaberson, Oermann & Shellenbarger, 2015). The in-service training program has some strengths and weaknesses. Five strengths have been identified. Firstly, it saves on training costs as the nurses are trained en mass. Secondly, it ensures that topics relevant to the organization are addressed to improve performance. Thirdly, it offers customizes training that addresses current and real issues. Fourthly, it is convenient since the training is organized by the organization with the logistical issues addressed. Finally, it encourages team building among the nurses. Still, the program presents three challenges. Firstly, it places pressure on nurses by forcing them to attend training. Secondly, it places a burden on the organization by creating a need to ensure that the training resources are availed as required to include room, equipment and trainings, and even getting the nurses to the training location. Thirdly, it does not offer networking opportunities since it only engages the nurses who work together. As such, the in-service training program presents strengths and weaknesses (Billings & Halstead, 2012).
Recommend one or more policy or practice changes designed to balance the competing needs of resources, workers, and patients, while addressing any ethical shortcomings of the existing policies.
There is a need for a policy change to balance the competing needs of resources, nurses and other stakeholders while addressing ethical shortcomings. The policy change would involve greater emphasis on consultations with stakeholders to ensure that relevant training programs are identified, resources are allocated where they are required, and nurses concerns are addressed so that they are encouraged to attend the trainings. This approach would also ensure that nurses are motivated to attend the trainings (Iwasiw, Andrusyszyn & Goldenberg, 2019).
References
Billings, D. & Halstead, J. (2012). Teaching in nursing: a guide for faculty (4th ed.). Philadelphia, PA: Elsevier/Saunders.
Gaberson, K., Oermann, M. & Shellenbarger, T. (2015). Clinical teaching strategies in nursing (4th ed.). New York, NY: Springer Publishing Company, LLC.
Iwasiw, C., Andrusyszyn, M. & Goldenberg, D. (2019). Curriculum development in nursing education (4th ed.). Burlington, MA: Jones & Bartlett.
Pokorski, M. (2018). Current concepts in medical research and practice: advances in experimental medicine and biology. Cham: Springer International Publishing AG.
Sang, D. & Dearholt, S. (2018). John Hopkins nursing evidence-based practice (3rd ed.). Indianapolis, IN: Sigma Theta Tau International.
Sanwick, T., Forrest, K. & O’Brien, B. (2019). Understanding medical education: evidence, theory and practice (3rd ed.). Oxford: John Wiley & Sons, Inc.
Developing Organizational Policies and Practices Essay Paper