Leadership and Organizations Assignment 2nd Sample

MGT 605 Leadership and Organizations Assignment Sample

Summary

The modern business world is characterised by the modern technology, especially the digital one. In today’s era, businesses are making use of digital technology for various purposes. Researchers have shown some positives aspects of using digital technology on businesses. Healthcare sector has tremendous potential of implementing digital technology and gain various advantages from it. The following report analysed the impact of digitalisation on business operations and performance. The selected business entity was Ramsay Healthcare. It was revealed from the literature review that there could be both positive as well as negative impacts of digital technology on business. For that purpose, data collection was carried out and secondary data sources, such as journal articles, books, annual reports, sustainability reports, and other online sources were explored and useful information or data was separated out. It was also revealed that digital technology has improved the quality of customer services and revenue of the organisation. It was also revealed that number of customer admitting into the hospital have increased. Based on the literature review and data analysis, certain recommendations are provided.

Introduction- MGT 605 Leadership and Organizations Assignment Sample

The digital technology has penetrated every sector and is transforming them tremendously. It is helping businesses in addressing the changing requirements of clients and customers. Also, a huge improvement is noticed in the quality of healthcare services. In the following report, the impact of digital technology on process and functions of a healthcare industry. For that purpose, Ramsay Healthcare is selected for data collection and data analysis. Based on the results of data, certain recommendations are provided.

Methodology and Theoretical Concepts

In the following research project, the qualitative research was carried out. Most part of the research was based on the perceptions of other researchers and business experts on digital technology and its impact on healthcare business. Apart from this, the annual report of Ramsay Healthcare were also referred to figure out the investments done on technology and purchase of machinery. The primary variables of the research project comprise dependent variable (business financial performance) and independent variable (investment on digital technology). The final impact of digital technology would be on business profits. Point to note here is that expenditure done on digital technology falls under plant and equipment cost. There is no separate mention of it in the annual report. Due to shortage of time and resources, past five years of data was referred.

The data once collected from the annual reports and other secondary sources, such as journal articles, online news portals, and other websites are fed into MS Excel and sorted. Once this was done, the data was presented in the forms of graphs and charts. This would help in better understanding of the audience and would convey the information in a better way. The prerequisite of secondary data collection was literature review in which high quality and peer reviewed journal articles were reviewed to build the argument. The positive impacts and negative impacts were detailed out in brief.

For instance, Habran, et.al, (2018) mentioned that digital technology has brought numerous changes in the processes and modus operandi of healthcare organisation. Digitalisation has helped organisations by being a pivotal pillar in serving the patients. Digital technology like adaptive intelligence tools and Tele-health solutions are helping hospitals in lowering down communication barriers between physicians and patients. This has remarkably improved access to care facilities and also enhanced overall satisfaction of the patients. This has ultimatelyhelped healthcare facilities to improve their competitiveness and increase their position in the market (Habran, et.al, 2018).

Göransson (2019) mentioned about the use of Artificial Intelligence in healthcare. The author argued that in the coming years, AI-based robots can be able to substitute the human’s involvement in the treatment of patients. In long-term, this would help healthcare centres to cut cost and expenditure and improve their profits. Also, it was mentioned that healthcare professionals would be able to serve their patients with better quality as digital technology would provide them with all the medical history and prior treatments taken by the patient. By storing the data on servers or in cloud storage, medical experts can be able to retrieve the information of their patients and provide medication in case of any emergency (Jafarkarimi, et.al, 2014). According to Yúdice (2017), using digital technology in medical sector has lowered the rate of medication faults and mistakes. The experts are able to analyse patient records through software and get description automatically and also they get alerted in case of potential risk or any error detected. All these have improved patient’s satisfaction, customer base,and business profits (Yúdice, 2017).

However, there are some negative aspects of using digital technology in healthcare. Iivari, et.al (2017) mentioned that with the increase in reliability of healthcare sector on digitalised mode of record-keeping, the risk of data theft has also increased. In 2015, hackers have stolen the data of about 80 million patients and employees from the US’s hospitals. The information can be used illicitly to gain access to other information. Also, potential malware and viruses can cause damage to patient’s record leading to error in medication. This would increase legal and financial risks of healthcare centres (Ramsay Annual HealthCare, 2019).

From the literature review, it is quite clear that potential benefits of using digital technology are more than limitations. Hence, the use of digital technology is supported based on the literature review. However, this has to be analysed in case of Ramsay Healthcare through data analysis.

Data Analysis &Results

Table 1: Financial Data of Ramsay Healthcare

Looking into the data collected from the annual reports of the organisation, it can be seen that with an increase in the plant and equipment cost, the net profits of Ramsay Healthcare are also increasing (see figure 1). This can be attributed to the increase in productivity and efficiency of the organisation. As mentioned in the annual report of 2019, the Ramsay group is working to position uniquely the digitalisation and integrate it with the healthcare model. The organisation is also working continuously on driving digitalisation to deliver effective care services.

Referring to the figure 2, its shows the care quality commission ratings. It can be seen that nearly 90% of the patients feel that Ramsay’s current services and healthcare facilities are good while only 10% feel that the services need improvements. As per the CEO of the company, there has been an increment of 20% in overall rating over past 2 years. This can be attributed to the expansion of digital platforms to provide more healthcare services to patients.

Seeing the image shown in figure 3, it can be said that with the inclusion of digital technology in the healthcare sector, the number of patients taking admission in the hospitals are increasing. This can be attributed to better services and high patient satisfaction rate. Digital technology has helped the healthcare centre to provide more and more services and even serve patients living in remote areas. Overall, it can be said inducing funds in digital technology is beneficial for Ramsay as its market share and revenue are increasing day by day.

Conclusions

From the complete analysis of the usage digital technology, it is quite clear that digital technology has both positive and negative impacts on business processes and operations. The impacts on Ramsay Healthcare are quite positive. Its revenue, patient satisfaction, and customer ratings have been improved with time after digitalisation of operations and processes. Seeing the potential of digital technology, certain recommendations are provide in the next section.

Recommendations

The following are the recommendations for Ramsay Healthcare:-

1. To implement digital technology across all the process, it is required to build the process roadmap. This would require cooperation and collaboration of design team, operational team, technical staff, technology, and healthcare experts. The plans are required to be prepared and tested out (Habran, et.al, 2018).
2. Ramsay Healthcare is required to make patients and its staff aware of the data security threats and prepare a guidelines to protect data from theft. Also, a regular update of software and cloud storage device is suggested. A regular risk assessment is also recommended for the organisation (Imison, et.al, 2015).
3. In order to improve the efficiency and productivity while using digital technology, it is required that the staff does not lack behind the pace of digitalisation. They are required to be trained on regular basis. This would ensure proper implementation and increase the success rate of the digital technology in operations (Jafarkarimi, et.al, 2014).

References

• Göransson, C. (2019).  Developing and evaluating an interactive app to support self-care among older persons receiving home care  (Doctoral dissertation, Örebro University).
• Gu, V. C., Hoffman, J. J., Cao, Q., &Schniederjans, M. J. (2014). The effects of organizational culture and environmental pressures on IT project performance: A moderation perspective.  International Journal of Project Management,  32(7), 1170-1181.
• Habran, E., Saulpic, O., &Zarlowski, P. (2018). Digitalisation in healthcare: An analysis of projects proposed by practitioners.  British Journal of Healthcare Management,  24(3), 150-155.
• Hammersley, M. (2017). Deconstructing the qualitative-quantitative divide 1. In  Mixing methods: Qualitative and quantitative research  (pp. 39-55). Routledge.
• Iivari, M., Gomes, J. F., Pikkarainen, M., Häikiö, J., &Ylén, P. (2017, June). Digitalisation of healthcare: Use of data in policy making. In  ISPIM Innovation Symposium  (p. 1). The International Society for Professional Innovation Management (ISPIM).
• Imison, C., Castle-Clarke, S., Watson, R., & Edwards, N. (2016). Delivering the benefits of digital health care.
• Jafarkarimi, H., Sim, A., Saadatdoost, R., &Hee, J. M. (2014). The impact of ICT on reinforcing citizens’ role in government decision making.  International Journal of Emerging Technology and Advanced Engineering,  4(1), 642-646.
• O’Brien, B. C., Harris, I. B., Beckman, T. J., Reed, D. A., & Cook, D. A. (2014). Standards for reporting qualitative research: a synthesis of recommendations.  Academic Medicine,  89(9), 1245-1251.
• Ramsay Annual HealthCare. (2019). Annual and Financial Reports. Retrieved 15 November 2019, from https://www.ramsayhealth.com/Investors/Annual-and-Financial-Reports
• Yúdice, G. (2017). 25 The challenges of the new media scene for public policies1.  The Routledge Handbook of Global Cultural Policy.