Management of Human Resources in the Healthcare Sector

Running head: HRM IN THE HEALTHCARE SECTOR
Management of Human Resources in the Healthcare Sector
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1HRM IN THE HEALTHCARE SECTOR
Article 1
Full Reference
Cogin, J. A., Ng, J. L., & Lee, I. (2016). Controlling healthcare professionals: how human
resource management influences job attitudes and operational efficiency. Human
resources for health, 14(1), 55. Retrieved from https://doi.org/10.1186/s12960-016-
0149-0
Research Objectives and Research Questions
The primary objective of Cogin, Ng and Lee (2016) is to analyse the manner in which
the process of management of human resources within the healthcare sector have evolved
over the years to support the needs of the employees and also influence their attitudes so as to
enhance organisational performance. More importantly, other important objectives that the
concerned authors have tried to explore in the article are to understand the factors which have
lead to the evolution of the HRM processes or practices which are presently being used
within the framework of the healthcare industry and also the manner in which they can be
improved further. Thus, the research questions that the authors have selected for the article
are-
1. How the HRM practices used in the healthcare sector have evolved over the years to
enhance the performance of the hospital staffs?
2. What are the factors which have contributed towards the evolution of the HRM
practices within the healthcare sector?
3. What are the ways through which the HRM practices used by the healthcare firms can
be further improved to support the needs of the employees?

2HRM IN THE HEALTHCARE SECTOR
Research Methodology
Cogin, Ng and Lee (2016) for the completion of this article have taken the help of the
secondary data analysis and qualitative analysis method and thereby used secondary sources
of information from seven different databases and also the reports of different healthcare
firms for the completion of the research work. More importantly, for the analysis of
secondary data that the authors collected the method of thematic analysis was used for their
interpretation. Furthermore, the researchers also interviewed around 34 individuals, namely,
“executive, healthcare managers, and employee” along with “physicians, nurses, and allied
health staff” for the collection of required data.
Summary of the Findings
The findings of the authors reveal the fact that unlike the earlier times the present-day
healthcare firms are increasingly taking the help of different kinds of effective HRM
practices to positively influence the attitude of the healthcare workers towards the work that
they perform and thereby to enhance the effectiveness of the organisations. Cogin, Ng and
Lee (2016) have found that “low levels of investment in people and a concentration on
transactional human resource (HR) activities which led to negative job attitudes such as low
morale and frustration among healthcare professionals” and this as a matter of fact was one of
the primary reasons for the below par performance of the different healthcare professionals.
The authors further found that the healthcare firms can enhance the effectiveness of their
HRM practices by aligning these practices with the needs of the employees and also the goals
outlined by them.
Summary of the Conclusion
The authors conclude the article by stating that the evolution within the cannon of
HRM practices used by the healthcare firms have been brought on by necessity rather than

3HRM IN THE HEALTHCARE SECTOR
choice. However, at the same time they state that this has positively affected the firms and
also the employees by influencing their attitude towards the work that they perform and this
in turn had enabled the firms to improve their organisational efficiency.
Importance of the article for my essay
This article will be an integral source for my essay because of its focus on the manner
in which the HRM practices used by the healthcare firms have evolved over the years. More
importantly, the article is a peer-reviewed one as well as a credible one and was published in
the “Human resources for health”. Furthermore, the article published in the year 2016 is a
fairly recent one and the authors have both objectively and subjectively analysed the research
objectives or questions selected for the article.