Organizational Structure and Culture Term Paper

Organizational Structure and Culture - Term Paper Example In the context of the topic under consideration, the chosen health care organization is the Good Samaritan Hospital. The organizational structure at the Good Samaritan Hospital is flat. In the organization there is no provision of intervening management between the managers and the staff. The central idea governing the organization is that the experienced and well trained staff members are better equipped to take on the spot decisions if they are extended a greater autonomy and are involved in the overall decision making (Cunneen, 2008). In this organization the staff is seldom supervised by any intervening layers of management. Though this hospital is a large organization, it is possible to accommodate a flat organizational structure owing to the existence of varied independent units. The decision making process here is decentralized and encourages ample involvement of the employees. The flat structure of this hospital is the key to its supporting environment that fosters a client c entered care. Greater autonomy extended to the employees necessitates ample emphasis on learning and training (Cunneen, 2008). The employees here feel that they are amply empowered to innovate and resort to out of the box thinking that directly bolsters the quality of patient care (Cunneen, 20080. The staff has a direct access to the requisite resources required to extend an improved patient care with ample opportunities to develop as a professional. The staff is positively encouraged to look for the viable improvements and opportunities and resorting to new procedures and innovations aimed at improving patient care receive minimal resistance. The staff members are always encouraged to understand the patient needs and requirements are expected to take ownership of the issues and problems mentioned by the patients. The Management Information System resorted to at the Good Samaritan Hospital has well defined goals that are to enhance and streamline communication amongst employees, to bolster the organizational goals and objectives, to facilitate the exchange of complex information across the organization, reduce expenses by curtailing manual activities and to develop an objective system for saving and organizing information (Stanford, 2007). As, at this hospital, there are minimal intervening levels of management, the staff deployed at the specific units is required to report directly to the specific unit in charge. This speeds up the decision making processes and facilitates autonomy and a relaxed work environment (Stanford, 20070. However, the problem with this information structure is that as the entire unit members are required to report to the unit in charge, the bosses and managers here are required to take care of too many things. Going by the fact that the Good Samaritan Hospital has a flat organizational structure, it automatically facilitates a more open communication as compared to many other health care organizations. However, with so many staff memb ers reporting to so few managers, many a times this communication approach give way to much chaos (Stanford, 2007). The Hospital Director has an open door policy and any employee can approach the top management with ease and convenience. However, as this hospital is expanding with time, the Director has empowered his PA to manage communication and to filter and classify the communications reaching his office. It could be assumed that many a time the