Aligning Corporate Culture in Newly Acquired Hospitals
Values such as compassion, quality, thoroughness, and efficiency show that leaders expect employees to provide high-quality care. According to Buchanan (2007), organizational culture is shaped by the founder’s values, the industry, the business environment, and the top management’s vision and behavior. For example, operating in a cost-effective manner by providing an environment conducive to healing the whole person physically, emotionally, and spiritually may represent corporate goals. To convey these goals to employees at a newly acquired facility, and have employees implement the goals in daily operations, calls for commitment and involvement of top management (Certo, 2006). Studies show that organizational culture can be passed on to new employees, influences behavior at work, and operates at all levels of the organization (Buchanan, 2007). Corporate values, such as commitment to providing high-quality care that is accessible and affordable, continuously improving processes to preserve and enhance healthcare delivery, and improving organizational performance, must be conveyed to the new hospital’s employees. Such values are important for setting the tempo for performance at the corporate level and for creating an accepted behavioral norm throughout the hospital.
Organizational leaders must model the corporate culture and, through their actions, exhibit sound values in their character. They must package corporate priorities into a simple plan, making it easy for employees at the newly acquired hospital to remember, internalize, and act upon the cultural principles of the parent organization. With consistent behavior and total transparency, leaders at the corporate level can drive organizational culture, keeping employees focused on contributing to the organization’s mission. A culture where there is a sense of urgency because patient care is important, where employees feel good about their contributions and know that they will be supported by the organization even through adverse events, will be successful. In this kind of intentionally constructed culture, employees become motivated learners, speak frankly and openly, possess the right priorities, and bring their best to the organization.
Because culture touches and influences every function in an organization, it can help sustain success for years to come. Studies show that organizational culture can enhance performance and effectiveness (Goodman, Zammuto, & Gifford, 2001), and influences individuals, groups, and organizational behavior (Erdogan, Liden, & Kraimer, 2006).
Researchers have found that companies with “adaptive cultures” outperform the competition by significant margins (Tartell, 2014). An adaptive culture, as defined by Kotter and Heskett (1992), is one that “encourages risk taking, trusting, and a proactive approach where members of an organization actively support one another’s efforts to identify all problems and implement workable solutions” (p. 44). It is a culture that encourages learning and implementation of solutions. Hence, it is imperative to introduce a learning and development plan in order to align the newly acquired hospital with the existing culture. That process should include creating a top leadership team to operationalize corporate vision, drafting a corporate-sponsored curriculum, developing a training program led by corporate leaders to help newly acquired hospital employees understand expectations and values, and ensuring formal structures reinforce the desired culture. Research shows that changing organizational culture is possible; however, it is important to utilize a structured approach to change values, beliefs, norms, and behaviors (Schein, 1983) and to align the culture, vision, and organizational strategy in order to avoid resistance to change. Implementing such strategies will help attain and sustain the corporate goals of providing comprehensive, quality care in a convenient, compassionate, and cost-effective manner.
Ahmad Chaudhry is supply chain analyst at Prime Healthcare, Inc., in Ontario, California. He holds a doctoral degree in business administration, with an emphasis in corporate leadership and management, and a masters degree in business administration. Chaudhry can be reached at achaudhry1@prime
healthcare.com.
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