Attracting and Retaining Staffs in Healthcare Industry

Running head: ASSESSMENT 3
HRMT20024 T2 2018
Assessment 3
Essay on Attracting and Retaining staffs in the healthcare industry
Student’s name:
Name of the university:
Author’s note:

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Introduction
Human resources in healthcare feel pressure through increased demand and a shortage
of staffs. The HR department of healthcare overcomes the issues through a better
understanding of the challenges. In Australia, the healthcare sector is growing very fast and
HR professionals are gaining importance in the Healthcare industry (Wilson et al., 2009).
This paper focuses on the challenges of human resources in healthcare sector by investigating
five different themes. In the healthcare sector, the HR department is currently facing the
issues of employee relation challenges, diversity and work-life balance, employee turnover
and retention, performance management and motivation, rewards and compensation. Each of
the challenges is discussed in the following section. It is the primary objective of the HR
department in healthcare to strengthen the healthcare infrastructure, its coverage and
accessibility by developing the conditions of the human resources who are working in the
healthcare sector.
Employee Relations Challenges for HRM
Key stakeholders of industrial relation in healthcare are the employees, employers,
employee association, employer association, government and courts and tribunals. The
concept of employee relation is associated with industrial relations and it includes the process
like employment relationships and the management of conflict between employers, trade
unions and workers. In the healthcare sector, industrial conflict is avoided by developing
harmonious relations among the staffs (Bailey & Peetz, 2014). According to Unitary
approach, the industrial relation is grounded in mutual co-operation, teamwork, shared goals
and individual treatment. Unitary framework assumes that common interest and promotion of
harmony; the employer seeks the direct negotiation with employees (Bilen et al., 2013). On
the other side, Pluralistic approach perceives that it is quite inevitable to understand the

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conflict between staffs and the management. This conflict is perceived as helpful in
innovation and the growth of the organisation. In order to manage the conflict between the
staffs and the management; it is needed to have a strong union. In employment relations;
Australia is facing the issue of growing representation gap at workplace created by declining
union density. The rise of managerial unilateralism is being weak for non-union forms of
employee representation.
In the healthcare sector in Australia, employee relation is steeped in a myriad
regulation due to an exhaustive list of guideline on life safety, emergency management,
environment of care and human resources. In human resources; health care sector is verifying
staff orientation, on-going training and staff qualification and ensuring the staff sensitivity. In
Australia, the healthcare sector sets the minimum employment standards to protect the
employees from being in troubled due to the labour market. Safely Net provides the ease to
the employees who are working in the healthcare sector and this award was deeply
compromised during the year of Howard Government (Gartner, Schank & Schnabel, 2013).
In the healthcare sector, the employee relation has been facing the issue due to the wrong
structure of payment paradigm. Australia has been observing the decline of union density in
the healthcare sector as employees in healthcare may face the struggle to speak and to be
heard about the workplace problems. In the year 2009, the Fair Work Act was passed and it
focuses on the three key issues in employment relations; employee representation, managerial
unilateralism and safety net under the Fair Work regime. In addition, the continuous
technological shift is creating an issue in healthcare staffs.
Diversity and Work-Life Balance
Diversity management is a process of managing the people’s differences and
similarities. Managing diversity is built on a set of values which recognises the differences

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between people which create the potential strength for the organisation. Diversity
management is the process of creating the environment which allows contributing
organisational experience, goals and personal goals of the employees. According to Richard,
Roh & Pieper (2013), diversity within the workplace includes everyone and it extends to
personal, corporate background, function, education and personality. Diversity within the
organisation includes the sexual preference, lifestyle, geographic origin, exempt status and
tenure with the organisation. In the healthcare sector; the staffs must have the idea of
diversity as the staffs have to deal with the service users who might come from the different
ethnic background. The staffs have to treat and assist the service users from the different race,
creed or from a different religion. As opined by McCarthy, Darcy & Grady (2010), in the
healthcare sector; the staffs have to work in the multidisciplinary team in which the staff
members may come from different class, creed and ethnic background or from a different
religion. The staffs need to manage themselves to work within the team and share the work
goal. Equal Employment Opportunity (EEO) must be given to all the candidates to ensure
from the government to all the individuals to have the equal right regardless of sex, religion,
race and national origin. In addition, the Australian government takes the affirmative action
providing quotas and reparation to compensate for the past injustice suffered by a group.
In the healthcare sector; diversity is very important and staffs sometimes do the
mistake of not understanding the diversity management. The healthcare sector is facing the
challenges due to not selecting the diversity management like strategic, managerial and
operational. These diversity management factors provide two definite goals, workplace
culture and best outcomes of managing the human resources. According to Wilson et al.,
(2009), healthcare staffs mainly do not have fixed schedule as they have to work for long
hours and they do not have proper work-life balance. The staffs in the healthcare industry
face the issue of not maintaining work-life balance as a pervasive healthcare problem starts