In the healthcare industry, customer satisfaction is the main priority. Currently, the number of service providers has increased in the market, giving clients an advantage to shift from one pharmacy to the next based on the level of contentment. According to the Sunpharma group case study, the mystery shopper identified some areas worth improvement in the organization to facilitate patient happiness with the service delivery. The relationship between healthcare professionals and consumers influences the general performance of the institution. Competent pharmacists, laboratory technicians play a vital role in selling the company’s image to the public. Therefore, it is upon the human resource management to ensure they have the right staff that would promote the pharmacy’s position in the minds of people based on customer service delivery. This paper will identify the key problem facing the Sunpharma Group human resource management based on the case study and analyze effective solutions to overcome the issue.
Based on the feedback from the Mystery Shopping Report, pharmacists could not identify the health problems of clients effectively without asking questions, information of the products offered by the pharmacies were also incomplete. Furthermore, health providers did not provide recommendations to the customers. These results clearly show that the staff members lacked some competencies to aid in service provision. According to the statement by Linda’s assistant Hana Kubova “The report was not very positive about sales skills. Mr. Plail will not be happy about that” (Lackova et al., 2012, 73), which indicates that sales personnel have inadequate training to enrich their abilities.
Similarly, Hana continued to say, “We need to lay out what kind of training is needed and for whom, and also which training methods would be the most appropriate.” Furthermore, Linda Dolinova stated that “Of course, some imperfections were identified, particularly in sales and communication skills of pharmacists” (Lackova et al., 2012, 72). These accounts suggest that the human resource management had an issue with offering the relevant training and development to the workers in the organization.
For the company to have high consumer demand, it should ensure its staff members have adequate training and necessary developments to enhance their contribution to the business organization. Firstly, the human resource management team should define the training objectives and match them with the strategic goals of the pharmacy. The employees have different areas of specialization, therefore when a training program is enrolled, they should be trained in line with the services they offer. For example, pharmacists majorly handle customers’ queries; therefore, they should be coached on ways of developing a good rapport with clients to enhance satisfaction.
The HR management should adopt a training system that fosters adaptability and flexibility on the team members, like on-the-job training. The industry is fast-growing, and consumer knowledge has also increased; hence health specialists should be educated to fit in the market trends to meet consumers’ expectations (Ivanova et al., 2019). In addition, proper communication skills should be mandatory in any aspect of competency development to ensure medical professionals and salespersons can deliver the appropriate knowledge and information to the patients.
Another way the company can resolve the HR issue is by offering off-the-job development. The company should ensure after recruitment practices, the hired individuals should be taken to compulsory learning and development to increase their skills and experience. Further exposure would make the professionals gain efficient abilities that would enable them to handle customers. By focusing the training on personal growth, pharmacists would develop confidence.
On-the-job training allows the HR management to align the training methods with the weaknesses portrayed by the organizational staff members. The approach makes the professional workers learn relevant skills and techniques that would improve their service delivery (Nguyen et al., 2021). Further, learning through the job creates confidentiality amongst the workers therefore; employees can easily manage any emerging situation in the pharmacy. Similarly, off-the-job professional development is effective as it gives the medics and salesperson humble time to acquire knowledge. Its shortfall is the inability to connect the training goals with the needs of the company. This would make the staff less competent therefore lowering their ability to change with trends in the industry.
For the company and the HR department to facilitate the performance of Sunpharma, they should invest in the on-the-job development of employees. Engaging workers in training as they perform their daily routines would benefit both the firm and individual employees. Pharmaceutical operations will remain active while professionals are trained as well on how to improve their competency at work. The method would imply practical involvement, therefore, enhancing the development of essential skills like effective communication. Furthermore, the procedure will be less expensive since employees will be couched within the pharmacies, thus reducing expenditures like transport to training facilities. Moreover, pharmacists would be able to learn quickly and master the basic principles due to active involvement. The system would enable health providers to base their experience on the patient’s perspective because the simulation will be based on real clients. The technique would ensure efficient and effective service provision hence attracting more customers to the pharmacy.
References
Ivanova, I., Pulyaeva, V., Vlasenko, L., Gibadullin, A., & Sadriddinov, M. (2019). Digitalization of organizations: current issues, managerial challenges, and socio-economic risks. Journal Of Physics: Conference Series, 1399, 033038. Web.
Lackova, K, Polakova, B.M., Winn, J.B., & University of Denver. (2012). Improving customer service in sun pharma pharmacies. Case Research Journal, 32(3), 65-84.
Nguyen, T. Q., Nguyen, A. T., Tran, A. L., Le, H. T., Le, H. H. T., & Vu, L. P. (2021). Do workers benefit from on-the-job training? New evidence from matched employer-employee data. Finance Research Letters, 40, 101664. Web.