Organizational Structure in White Memorial Hospital

This article discusses the organizational structure of White Memorial Hospital, its strengths and limitations, and the importance of vision, mission, and goals. It also explores the matrix organization structure and its advantages and disadvantages. The article is relevant to healthcare management and organizational behavior courses.

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Organizational Structure in White Memorial Hospital
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Introduction
Organizational structures define the way tasks in an organization are allocated and
organized within the hospital. Lim (2017) suggests that it defines the management pattern in the
organization highlighting different levels of hierarchy in the organization and the relationship
between each of them. This structure is used in most organizations but it carries strengths and
limitations.
Organizational Structure in White Memorial Hospital
One strength of the structure is that it allows for specialization where people with similar
skills and roles are grouped thus improving efficiency and performance. Such employees hone
themselves thus leading to an in-depth knowledge and skill development (Ahmady, Mehrpour, &
Nikooravesh, 2016). Healthcare professional are allowed to specialize in one area of the
healthcare system and perfect their skills thus making them better. The hospital reaps these
benefits through increased service delivery that is realized in the number of satisfied patients.
Productivity is increased since the health professional work in functional specialized
areas. For example, each professional with particular specialization is paired with a colleague in
the same area to improve results since they can consult on issues (Johatch, 2014). When
healthcare organizations use efficiency as a strategy for their output, the benefits are increased
patient handling time which in turn leads to customer satisfaction and increased productivity.
The functional nature of the structure allows communication from one level of the
organization to another. Since subordinates report to their superiors, it makes it easy for
communication to flow from one level of the organization to another (Rabbinz, 2012). Further,
departmental communication in functional units is easy since employees understand each other
and the specialization language that they use to communicate with each other. Weber believed

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that when the structure is organized in a bureaucratic structure, it becomes easy to manage
communication since the chain of command is a straight line that allows easy flow of
communication.
Another strength that the structure presents to the organization is balancing workload
between different departments in the organization. By grouping similar tasks, the facility can
balance work between different departments by ensuring that those with similar tasks work to
achieve the best results (Lim, 2017). For example, when nurses coordinate themselves, they can
distribute tasks amongst themselves thus making it easy for them to achieve the required targets.
When employees are organized in functional groups, workload are also organized along that line
in the hospital thus creating an easy flow of tasks between departments in the facility.
However, the functional approach has management challenges since it is a rigid way of
managing the organization. Too much bureaucracy creates bottlenecks that make it difficult for
the organization to manage organizational change (Corkindale, 2011). There is also the challenge
of coordinating the departments since despite the fact that employees are grouped in functional
units, they observe a chain of command that makes it difficult to coordinate different.
Bottlenecks are part of the rigid nature of the structure since they delay decision making (Bai,
Feng, & Feng, 2016). In turn this whole process delays decision making since consultations have
to be made.
The structure has been criticized for failing to work in emergency situations. Hospitals
like White Memorial Hospital handle different levels of emergency especially as the upgrade
takes place. Such situations call for the health profession in charge to make life saving decisions
based on professional standards without having to consult higher authority (Bai, Feng, & Feng,
2016). The nature of the structure and mode of operation denies such opportunities to

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practitioners since they have to follow the right channel of command and ensure that they seek
approval from their supervisors before making a decision that they were sure it was right.
Therefore, the traditional structure delays critical decision making without giving a damn on the
magnitude of the situation that the junior employee is facing.
The individual decision making in this form of organization is limited since practitioners
have to rely on decisions that come from above them. Since the chain of command is what is
used to drive organizational activities, each line supervisor makes the decision through seeking
authority from above (Ghorbani, Noghabi, & Nikoukar, 2011). The rigidness of the structure
does not allow healthcare professional to improvise solutions that may apply to situations that
they are handling but rather they rely on superior decisions which may delay action.
The Importance of Vision, Mission and Goals to the Hospital
The mission statement of an organization defines the purpose that the organization exists
for through defining the direction that the organization takes. In the case of White Memorial
Hospital, the mission statement defines the role that each plays towards realizing the intended
goal that the hospital exists for. Through the statement “to provide quality”, every employee in
the hospital understands that quality defines every activity that they engage in and determines the
way they relate with patients and how their needs are met (Corkindale, 2011). Through the
mission customers understand how the organization aims to serve them. They may sometimes
include values that the organization also exists for. Through values, the mission aligns
employees with the organizational structure of the organization by determining how decisions
are made.
The vision of the hospital further describes the purpose by defining what the hospital
seeks to look like in future. Latif, Baloch, & Khan (2010) suggest that it gives direction for

Organizational Structure in White Memorial Hospital 5
employee behavior and provides them with the required aspiration when handling clients. It
gives a perspective of corporate values that are followed by employees for a given period which
ranges between five to ten years. For example, the vision of the hospital is to provide care that
responds to the changing needs of the community which is a focus in the future.
Organizational goals are plans that the hospital seeks to achieve within a period. They
exist as internal measures that the organization uses to gauge its performance about other
organizations. Goals are described as SMART since they need to be set within a given timeline
after which they are reviewed to determine if they have been met or not (Maduenyi, Oke, &
Akintude, 2015). The role of goals in an organization is thus providing focus to employees on the
priorities that they need to set within the healthcare facility. For example, for the case of White
Memorial Hospital the goal is to develop high performing multidisciplinary teams within the
specialist services to provide high-quality services. Employees within the hospital have to
prioritize their projects and activities that they engage in to determine how they relate and affect
the hospital goal.
The Matrix Organization structure
Another structure that can work well for the hospital is the matric structure which groups
employees based on both function and product. This structure allows teams of employees to
work to accomplish a task by taking advantage of different strengths of decentralization forms
(Laslo & Goldberg, 2008). For example, in a healthcare setting, a doctor cannot work alone
without the support of other practitioners like nurses and physicians who run other processes that
lead to the doctor’s room. Since hospitals like White Memorial Hospital receive patients in
different conditions, a rigid structure may not work well since patients have to be attended to
sometimes base on the need. As such this structure offers the best environment for healthcare

Organizational Structure in White Memorial Hospital 6
teams to organize themselves according to available tasks and the personnel within the facility
thus achieving better results in the healthcare system.
One advantage that this structure presents is the reduction of the rigidness of the
traditional functional structure. Under the matrix, decision making is simplified and innovation
can be achieved since groups are organized along task that exist (Galbraith, 2008). The structure
allows rapid creation of large-scale project structures is easy and tasks can be completed in a
much faster rate as compared to other structures.
Further, Tran & Tian (2013) adds that the structure allows the hospital management to
integrate project objectives with functional objectives of the organization. As the teams work,
they establish their own objectives that are aligned towards the functional needs of the
organization. Each team is independent and exists to achieve the short term objective that has
been set. In every matrix group, employees come and organize tasks using the available
resources to meet organizational goals. Once the goal has been met, the team can break up or
they can continue existing for future projects.
When teams are organized along the matrix system, they are motivated with a sense of
high morale and team spirit. The structure creates an element of teamwork that allows employees
to work with each other for a specific task (Bai, Feng, & Feng, 2016). Unlike in the case of the
functional structure where employees are organized in functional specialized groups, here
employees form working teams that have the best brains fitting the job description.
However, the structure has been criticized as increasing complexity in the organization
through creating lower structures that need to be managed. This may be termed a two boss
problem which makes managing of team difficult (Elsaid, Okasha, & Abdelghaly, 2013). Top

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managers will have a hard time managing the whole organization and smaller teams that exist at
the lower matrix level.
Conclusion
The organizational structure used by an organization determines the way tasks are
organized and shared in the hospital. The traditional functional structure has strengths that can be
applied to improve service delivery and productivity in the facility. However, the weaknesses of
the structure make it difficult for individual decision making since they have to rely on upper
management to pass the decision down the structure. With this structure the hospital can align its
mission, vision and goals based on the structure in the organization to increase productivity,
service delivery and customer satisfaction.

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