Healthcare Nursing Training and Development Program Design

Scope of Training in Healthcare Organizations

Large healthcare organizations will undoubtedly have a large scope of training. The investments-and-systems approach is beneficial for companies that can realize economies of scale. Through economies of scale, the unit cost for each individual trained decreases, which ultimately allows the cost of investments and systems to be spread throughout the entire organization. The systems approach is particularly beneficial because it creates and distills consistent behavior across the entire organization. Each individual who is trained generally receives and absorbs the same information as their peers, ensuring the continuity of the business and its underlying operations.

The scope will depend primarily on the needs of the business. In some instances, training may involve the entire healthcare organization, while in others it may require only a select department. In either case, investment in systems allows for the most efficient use of company resources, which is especially true for large organizations.

Needs Assessment and Organizational Analysis

Corporate employee training and development programs do a good job of identifying their needs within their respective organizations. However, emphasis must be placed on both needs assessments and organizational analysis for companies to remain competitive. Globalization in particular has created a new competitive dynamic within the healthcare profession, and training will therefore become more critical as competition becomes more pervasive.

With regard to overall healthcare training and development, licensing and accreditation standards must be strengthened to ensure the quality of nurses who enter the workforce. Certifying organizations must mandate the proper demonstration of core competencies and skills before conferring the nursing designation on students. According to the IOM report on the future of nursing, the nursing profession must undergo fundamental changes in the overall education of nurses. In many respects, the basic tenets of the profession will remain intact — including the need to meet the diverse needs of clients, leading teams of diverse individuals to advance organizational objectives, and advancing the science of nursing for the benefit of all clients. However, with impending reform, nurses must also be educated on concepts that are unfamiliar to the profession (Lucia, 2009). This is due to changes in legislation, budget deficits, and the overall aging of the American population.

To reflect these changes, healthcare personnel must possess different skills than those previously required. As the IOM report indicates, entry-level nursing practitioners must now be able to effectively work on cross-functional teams with varying and often conflicting objectives. As the healthcare industry consolidates, nurses must also be efficient when transitioning from their college coursework to their roles in primary care, acute care, and long-term care. A stronger need for well-rounded nurses with a diversified skill set will therefore be necessary to meet future demand. This need stems from the fact that healthcare companies are becoming more business oriented, meaning that healthcare personnel will require a more business-oriented background. Accordingly, training and academic preparation must be consistent with the ever-increasing skill set needed for successful nursing practice. Curricula must be realigned to reflect the changing dynamics within the healthcare profession overall.

With respect to organizational analysis, the healthcare profession must assess the quality and accreditation of healthcare professionals. This will be most significant in the nursing area, as more nurses will be needed to meet impending demand. Currently, there are three primary avenues through which prospective candidates can become registered nurses: earning a bachelor's degree in nursing, earning an associate's degree in nursing, or earning a certificate in nursing. All three pathways earn the prospective candidate the "RN" designation. However, the disparity between the skills and abilities associated with each pathway is significant (Fang, 2006). In particular, there is a shortage of graduate-degree nurses with advanced skills and proficiency (Levsey, 2007). A more streamlined, consistent, and seamless approach to nursing education is therefore warranted, and organizational analysis can help large healthcare organizations achieve this.

A future factor affecting needs assessment and organizational analysis is the changing workforce demographics of the country. A recent IOM report encourages a more minority-inclusive approach to the nursing profession. Minority nurses are often underrepresented in the profession, which directly reflects the lack of minority representation within undergraduate student bodies as a whole. The IOM therefore calls for a renewed focus on increasing and retaining minority enrollment in the nursing field. Training programs for nurses should reflect the changing dynamics of the industry, including greater attention to competencies related to primary care, disease prevention, and overall health promotion — topics that extend well beyond acute care settings and ensure that nurses are prepared to work in an evolving environment.

Training Program Design

The nursing profession is undergoing fundamental changes with respect to skill requirements and development. A new regulatory environment, coupled with increased scrutiny of the profession, will dramatically impact nursing practice. The newly enacted HR 3962 Act has profound implications for both the industry and those who practice within it, and it will have a direct impact on the objectives of training programs.

As a recent IOM report indicates, future job requirements in healthcare will be more service and business oriented. In order to maintain higher quality service standards, training objectives must be aligned with overall organizational objectives. In the future, training objectives will encompass a broad array of business skills and abilities to reflect the changing dynamic of the healthcare industry. Effective training design will help foster and facilitate the customer-centered change taking place in the sector. Healthcare practitioners will need a better understanding of quality management methods in addition to broader concepts of quality service (Draper, 2011). As the healthcare system continues its rapid reform, nurses must also be aware of the effects these changes will have on their roles and responsibilities within the profession (Levsey, 2009).

Legislation has had a particularly profound impact on the healthcare industry. Due to the HR 3962 Act, the nursing profession is undergoing a fundamental shift in the patient experience, as the U.S. healthcare system moves its focus from acute and specialty care toward primary care, which in turn requires a shift in business operations. Training objectives must therefore focus on developing competent personnel in the merits of quality customer service. Furthermore, personnel must be effective at reducing costs within the organization. As healthcare costs continue to rise as a proportion of GDP, personnel who can recognize cost-inefficient behaviors provide a meaningful benefit to their organizations. Training objectives must therefore align themselves with the changing dynamics of the business.

References

Draper, E., LaDou, J., & Tennenhouse, D. J. (2011). Occupational health nursing and the quest for professional authority. New Solutions, 21, 47–81.

Fang, D., Wilsey-Wisniewski, S. J., & Bednash, G. D. (2006). 2005–2006 enrollment and graduations in baccalaureate and graduate programs in nursing. American Association of Colleges of Nursing.

Levsey, K. R., Campbell, D., & Green, A. (2007). Yesterday, today, and tomorrow: Challenges in securing federal support for graduate nurses. Journal of Nursing Education, 46(4), 176–183.

Lucia, P. R., Otto, T. E., & Palmier, P. A. (2009). Performance in nursing. Reviews of Human Factors and Ergonomics, 5, 5–39.