Current Trends in Healthcare and their Impact on Human Resource Management

Selected trend: Growing demand for healthcare services due to ageing baby boomers and
increased number of insured people

The past ten years have seen a large increase in the demand of healthcare services.
Various factors have contributed to this increase. First, the ageing of baby boomer generation
has led to an increase in demand for healthcare services. The baby boomer generation
includes people who were born after the Second World War between 1946-1961 when there
was a large spike in childbirth rates (Vogenberg & Santilli, 2018). In 2011, the first bunch of
baby boomers hit 65 years. For the past nine years, tens of millions have baby boomers have
aged. The sheer numbers of this generation mean that their ageing is likely to have a major
impact on healthcare. This is because the healthcare needs of a person increase as they age.
Another factor that has led to increase in demand of healthcare services is increasing number
of people with healthcare insurance. Since the passing of the Affordable Care Act in 2009,
the number of people with healthcare insurance has significantly increased. For instance,
between 2008 and 2016, the number of people lacking healthcare insurance among low-
income groups declined by almost 10% (Glied & Jackson, 2017).

The increasing number of people seeking healthcare services has led to increasing
demand for healthcare personnel, such as physicians and nurses. As a result, there has been a
massive increase in competition among healthcare providers for the small pool of talent that
is available in the market (Vogenberg & Santilli, 2018). Therefore, it is increasingly difficult
for human resource departments to get talented healthcare personnel. The situation is made
even more difficult by additional considerations of patient safety and care that need to be
made that have forced human resource to be more meticulous during recruitment.

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Characteristics of an Effective HR Department

Some of the characteristics of an effective HR management include organization,
ethics, communication, and expertise. Organization relates to the ability of the HR
department to manage time appropriately so that its personnel can efficiently accomplish all
the tasks at hand. Ethics involve maintaining discreetion when dealing with private employee
information and being honest in all of the department’s engagements. With regards to
communication, it relates to the ability of the department to relay information in a clear and
effective manner to all employees. Lastly, expertise touches on the level of knowledge, skills,
and general competence of human resource personnel (Rudhramoorthy & Sarkar, 2019).

Of these characteristics, the one that is likely to help the department to respond to the
selected trend is experttise. With increased market competition for talent, human resource
personnel will need to use their expertise in the field to find the best talent in the market.
They will also employ the same expertise to retain such talent.

Common HRM Metrics

Time to hire

This is the duration between the time that a position opens up and the time that a
candidate signs the job contract (Rudhramoorthy & Sarkar, 2019). Time to hire shows the
efficiency of an organization’s recruitment process. If time to hire takes a long time, it shows
that either the organization has an inefficient hiring process or that it is difficult to fill the
positions that it is advertising for. With shortage of healthcare personnel, many healthcare
organizations are experiencing higher time to hire periods.

Cost per hire

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This metric shows the costs that an organization incurs when hiring new employees
(Rudhramoorthy & Sarkar, 2019). The less the cost per hire the more efficient the
organization’s recruitment process. The need to ensure that healthcare professionals have the
right qualifications, skills, and experience that allows them to offer safe and high quality
healthcare services to patients has significantly increased cost per hire in healthcare
organizations.

Training expenses per employee

This is the cost of training an employee in an organization (Rudhramoorthy & Sarkar,
2019). If the organization spends a lot of money training its employees, it could be because it
is not employing individuals that are experienced enough. In healthcare, increasing emphasis
on safety and quality of care has forced my organizations to increase the resources that they
spend on training in order to ensure that their personnel are being to provide services of high
quality.

Early turnover

This one of the most important HRM metrics. It shows the percentage of recruits that
leave in the first year (Rudhramoorthy & Sarkar, 2019). High early turnover level is an
indicator of low mismatch between individuals that the organizatio hires and their positions
or between the individuals and the organization. Since high early turnover is expensive for
the organization, it is important to keep the number down. High demand for healthcare
personnel may have contributed to high early turnover as healthcare personnel

Revenue per employee

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This metric is an indicator of the quality of the employees that the organization hires
(Rudhramoorthy & Sarkar, 2019). When an organization hires highly talented employees it is
likely to record a higher revenue per employee metric. In healthcare, employing individuals
who are skilled and experienced is likely to increase revenue per employee because of their
ability to offer high quality services.

Strategic Importance of the Healthcare Trend

Increasing demand of healthcare services due to ageing of baby boomers and
increasing number of people with health insurance has great strategic importance to
healthcare organizations. With more people requiring healthcare services, healthcare
organizations are likely to see an increase in their revenues and profits. However, for them to
experience an increase in revenue and profits, they need to ensure that their services are safe,
efficient, timely, and patient-centered. Human resource management will play a major role in
the achievement of this goal through hiring qualified and skilled healthcare personnel, and
then training and motivating them so that they are able to offer quality and safe services to
patients.

Conclusion

The increasing number of people seeking healthcare services primarily because of the
large of ageing baby boomers and increased number with healthcare insurance presents both
a challenge and an opportunity for healthcare organizations. The challenge is adequately
meeting the healthcare needs of increased number of clients. Human resource management
can help meet this challenge through getting the required talent from a competitive labor
market so that healthcare organizations can make use of the opportunity presented by this
trend – increasing their revenues and profits.

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References

Glied, S., & Jackson, A. (2017). The future of the Affordable Care Act and insurance
coverage. American journal of public health, 107(4), 538-540.

Vogenberg, F. R., & Santilli, J. (2018). Healthcare trends for 2018. American health & drug
benefits, 11(1), 48.

Rudhramoorthy, K., & Sarkar, S. (2019). HR metrics and workforce analytics: it is a journey,
not a destination. Human Resource Management International Digest.