Hialeah Hospital in Miami, Florida, has more than 900 staff members in employ. The position of the Chief Nursing Officer (CNO) is occupied by Maribel Torres, who devotes more than twenty years of life to nursing (“Leadership Profile,” 2020). Being the CNO, Maribel takes responsibility for the maintenance of patient care standards and the improvement of the quality of the provided care. In addition to that, she bears liability for the precise formulation and proper implementation of new nursing strategies. In this interview, I have asked Maribel Torres how she sees the mission, strong and weak sides of the Hialeah Hospital.
First of all, Maribel emphasizes that nurses’ management is not as easy as it might seem from the first sight. She agrees with Yoder-Wise (2019) that CNO’s title does not automatically mean that a person would be an efficient leader. According to Torres, the CNO should not forget that the chosen management strategy should serve the hospital’s mission. The mission of Hialeah Hospital is to provide patients with the care of high-quality at the right time and place. Therefore, nurses should be ready to perform a broad set of healthcare services that include neonatal intensive and emergency care, cardiology, geriatrics, surgery, orthopedics, and outpatient services.
Talking about the hospital’s strategic plan, Maribel says that she used to develop the vision statement ones in three years. Nevertheless, she constantly monitors the external environment to notice any changes that might affect the well-being and the overall performance of the hospital. In this context, the ongoing pandemic of COVID-19 could not be ignored because this compelled Maribel to shift the focus on penitents diagnosed with the coronavirus. Apart from the external environment, the CNO also controls the internal one. More precisely, she measures the effectiveness of the chosen structure, the sufficiently of financial and human resources, and the development capabilities. The analysis of the internal environment conducted in 2018 indicated that the number of nurses is not enough since they are overloaded with tasks and responsibilities. Hence, the nursing staff was enlarged.
The administration of the hospital, in the first place, should be concerned with being responsive to the needs of the key stakeholders, i.e., patients. Maribel Torres argues that 900 staff members and almost 400 skilled-care beds allow Hialeah Hospital to provide medical help to anyone who needs it. In addition to that, the CNO claims that the success of any organization or business depends on the commitment of the employees. Therefore, she says that being the leader, one of her goals is to inspire the nurses and do not let them forget that their job is vitally important for the entire society.
During the interview, it was curious to notice that Maribel was talking not only of the strengths of Hialeah Hospital but of its weaknesses as well. The hospital has numerous advantages, such as a convenient location, a good reputation, and proper technological equipment. However, the hospital suffers from the absence of a clear and valid marketing plan to compete with other hospitals more effectively. By the way, the distinctive feature of Hialeah Hospital is that it has a system of online registration that enables patients to choose the suitable date and time of the appointment. What is more, the hospital regularly conducts free classes at which everyone could receive useful advice or undergo screenings.
To conclude, in Torres’s nursing vision, Hialeah Hospital is the place where all patients receive immediate and high-quality help from a wide range of specialists. Despite the fact that the hospital’s overall performance is successful, the interview revealed some unresolved issues with marketing that should be fixed. Nevertheless, the hospital administration managed to adapt it to the fast-changing circumstances of the COVID-19 pandemic.
References
Leadership Profile – Maribel Torres, CNO. (2020). Web.
Yoder-Wise, P. S. (2019). Leading and managing in nursing (7th ed.). Elsevier, Mosby.