Negotiation Case Study

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Institution

Organizations mostly find it difficult managing their finances especially when some employees stay dormant because their services are not required. Medical Care centers have different types of staffs who have specified duties. As a manager in one of the leading healthcare center, I wished to cut down the overhead costs while maintaining the revenue cycle. The process was critical, but I managed to resolve some of the key issues. The following is a negotiation plan and the resolving steps.

Negotiation plan

Goal statement

Every financial, year Medical Care centers find themselves looking for ways of cutting down their operating costs in order to maintain their financial friability. The current business environment is extremely demanding, and managers should ensure every activity or operation in the medical practice has a financial benefit. A manager should plan on how to achieve the best results at the lowest cost possible (CaliforniaHealthline, 2012). Medical Care physicians receive much salary, but their duties are remarkably minimal because they only attend to patients when there is an emergency. In my plan to cut down the operations cost in my Healthcare center, I decided to reduce the number of visits for the physician to once every two weeks, and later once every two months. This negotiation will analyze the process of minimizing dormant staff operations, and come up with alternatives and possible outcomes for such decisions.

Analysis of the perspectives/positions of the parties involved

The physician has a clean reputation for the healthcare, and we have a perfect professional relationship although he seems to take advantage of this by visiting the patients more often. Every visit costs money and the more he comes the higher the cost of maintaining the medical practice. When medical practices fail to reduce the cost of operations several instances occur. First, the medical practice faces a drastic fall in the wealth of stakeholders due to the high cost of paying physician unnecessary salaries. This reduces government revenues leading to more pressure on Medicare and Medicaid funding whose full recovery might take years. Second, the medical practice faces a reduction in the availability of investment and credit funds. This would lead into the healthcare receiving no credits from financial institutions (Allawi, 2009). With all this pressure as a manager, I will have to analyze the productivity of this physician and design a good visit plan saves the overall cost.

The number of visits made by the physician in the medical practice should be minimized because most patients are stable and monthly prescriptions would work perfectly for them. The reduction plan would involve a perfect strategy. Budget reduction in a medical practice requires each department to cut down its expenses to a certain amount. This only occurs through doing away with operations that seem to spend more money. The physician is an external party who only comes to visit his patients. Rescheduling his visits would save the medical practice more cash and allow more staff retention. In addition, some permanent staff members receive little pay, whereas they undertake a lot of duties. The state federal law does not allow physicians to see their patients more often because they might be interested in patients’ money and not their health (Minnesota Department of Health, 2012).

The fact that the physician was my best friend led to delays in my plans because I feared he might terminate all his visits to the healthcare center. The physician could just write prescriptions for his patients, which less costly and time saving for both patients and the medical practice. On the other hand, a proper understanding between me and the physician would make things work out smart (American HealthCare Solutions, 2012. First, the approach method I used was very poor. All other negotiations were achieved but he could not allow me to cut his visit days. The expected goals were not fully met because I never involved anyone in my decision.

Cost reduction strategies in an organization require the involvement of many parties. Availability of restructuring manager ensures the strategies are well structured, and any default is fully dealt with. Second, the managers should set cost reduction goals. Negating on the impact of reducing the visiting time should be analyzed in terms of the positive and negative outcomes of the process to the medical practice, patients, and the physician. In addition, there was lack of pre-performance objectives that could only focus on the importance of reducing the amount of time the physician spends in the healthcare to twice per month.

The possible alternative outcomes

From the above negotiation, some possible outcomes could be felt at the end. First, the physician could demand a full explanation regarding why his visits should be reduced and yet the medical practice had signed a contract with him. The following outcome carries a lot of weight because the physician could sue the medical practice for neglecting patients their rights. Second, the physician could request for a compensation for the cut days. This would cost the healthcare more revenue, since the physician would be receiving his normal salary even when the trips to the medical practice are minimized. Moreover, the organization could consider offering him permanent employment with the same salary, but more duties. The following outcome could make the medical practice lay-off some of casuals in order to cater for the new salaries induced by the physician.

The steps that led to resolution 

In resolving the following issues, a labor steps were followed.

Assessing the compatibility of the suggested plans with the Fair Labor Standard Act helps in determining the best options that a manger should take while dealing with un-employment or reduction of duties.

Using conduct of labor negotiations in collective bargaining between the physician and mangers about the contract and the reasons for such decision,

Negotiating with the physician concerning the reviewed duties and their benefits to the medical practice.

Analysis of the outcomes

According to Bossidy & Charan (2002), most managers have a hard time resolving organizational issues because they always believe they are very perfect in management. Executing some critical issues in an organization is a hard task that requires techniques and understanding of the possible outcomes of the strategy. Moreover, the vision component in an organization should focus on the future results that allow equal sharing of resources. The targets and missions derived by the management wishes to achieve assists in identifying the guiding objectives that an organization adopts in order to improve its performance (Hertz, 2006). On the other hand, medical practices sometimes consider reducing the cost through in-house operations where they make use of their staff to check the patients.

References

Allawi, S. A. (2009). Reducing Costs: Execution is Critical. Retrieved from;

www.performancelogic.com

American Healthcare Solutions. (2012). Labor Relations. Retrieved from:

http://www.americanhs.com/strategy/labor-relations.aspx

Bossidy, L. & Charan, R. (2002). Execution: The Discipline of Getting Things Done. Atlfeld,

Inc.a

CaliforniaHealthline. (2012). Medical practices Taking Steps To Reduce Operating Expenses.

Retrieved from:

http://www.californiahealthline.org/articles/2011/2/7/medical practices-taking-steps-to-reduce-operating-expenses.aspx

Cassidy, J., (1995). An evaluation of Section 232(4) of the Corporations Law and the

directors’ duty of due care, skill, and diligence. Australian Business Law Review, 23(3), pp. 184-184.

Hertz, H. (2006). Health Care Criteria for Performance Excellence: Baldrige National

Quality. Business and Economics. DIANE

Minnesota Department of Health. (2012). Code of Federal Regulations Medical practice Conditions of

Participation. Retrieved from:

http://www.health.state.mn.us/divs/fpc/profinfo/lic/cfrhosp.htm