Stakeholder Involvement Paper – UnitedHealth Care Group Inc. Strategic Planning Approach
Introduction
According to Istepanian et al., a strategic plan is a leadership tool in health care system which needs a focus, openness, and commitment (2014). In order to realize the outcomes of the streamlined efforts, a strategic plan must integrate a detailed plan of determination and ambitions, a vibrant evaluation of an organization’s activities and identification of what to do to safeguard its prospects. When plans and strategies are successfully implemented five possible outcomes are delivered. (1) Drives accountability and effective implementation, (2) develop understanding, insight, and commitment, (3) focuses, allocates and aligns resources, (4) produces meaningful differentiation, and (5) define, develops, and sustains a value advantage.
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UnitedHealth Group
UnitedHealth Group is a profit managed health care that offers healthcare products and insurance services. The products and services allow people, develop customer choice and reinforce patient benefactor affiliations through the healthcare continuum (Cox and Semanskee, 2016). Defining the quality of healthcare services and products are influenced by two different primary stakeholders, the internal and external. A substantial change affecting one element will redesign the whole organization. Stakeholder Involvement Paper – UnitedHealth Care Group Inc. Strategic Planning Approach
The internal stakeholders consist of the management (engineering, pharmaceutical managers, clinical managers, and human resource manager), non-management (nursing, environmental services, administration), and professional staff. Stakeholders, as asserted by (Davis, 2014), are the most powerful group in a healthcare industry. The external shareholders consist of everyone else such as the patients, suppliers, competitors, related healthcare organizations, government agencies, private accrediting associations, professional associations, third-party payers, labor unions, special interest group and the local community. After a thorough SWOT analysis process, the UnitedHealth Group has identified that the strengths of the company were proficiencies in the differentiated health aids market segment, strong presence in high margin health service business trademark and national scale helping influence proficiencies.
The strong presence in high margin health services business helps the UnitedHealth Group organization’s leadership management in the health benefits market segment. The organization is equipped with strong information and communication technology founded on quality health delivery services through its business components which are Prescriptions Solutions, optimum health, and Ingenix. Stakeholder Involvement Paper – UnitedHealth Care Group Inc. Strategic Planning Approach
National scale is helping influence proficiencies and trademark. UnitedHealth Group leads globally with its insurer’s services and the biggest public traded health indemnity organizations in the United States (Davis, 2014). Lastly, the proficiencies in a differentiated health benefits market segment of UnitedHealth Group provides a strong suite of products comprising vision, dental, pharmacy benefit management (PBM), and Medicare services.
Internal stakeholders
Internal stakeholders are directly involved in the operations and the strategy of the UnitedHealth Group. The organizations’ mission and vision are to help people live healthier lives and help make the health system work healthier for everybody (Davis, 2014). The workers have a substantial fiscal and time savings in the enterprise, play a vital role in the plan, policies, and processes the organizations carries out. Managers play significant roles in determining the strategy of the organization, as well as the making a substantial voice in making critical decisions in the organization. Lastly, the owners form the stem of the organization. UnitedHealth Group owners are held liable for the influences the industry has, as well as having a substantial role in the plan. Owners make important health decisions both on internal and external stakeholders. Stakeholder Involvement Paper – UnitedHealth Care Group Inc. Strategic Planning Approach
External stakeholders
Understanding the impacts of the UnitedHealth Group from the wider perspective of external stakeholders is quickly realized when various groups of stakeholders are identified. The stakeholder theory of business ethics and organizational management discourses the ethics and morals in handling an enterprise. The key players of UnitedHealth Group external stakeholders such as customers play a significant role in helping the organization fulfills the needs of its clients through service and product delivery. An operative relationship with customers maintains a healthy community. Suppliers and other strategic alliances are independent. The suppliers maintain a strong relationship with the organization to have an effective operational process. The government tax business considers the profit motive involved in UnitedHealth Group activities. The government offers regulatory oversight, making sure that all activities in an organization are accounted for and providing legal measures responsible by the industry representatives.
Stakeholder relationships.
UnitedHealth Group stakeholder relationship is one that supports the Healthcare objectives and actions. The two primary types of stakeholder relationships (potential for threat, and potential for a corporation) makes it possible to classify the four types of UnitedHealth Group stakeholder relationships. The four main stakeholder relationships are the mixed blessing relationship, the supportive relationship, the non-supportive relationship, and the marginal relationship. These relationships must be mirrored with both the external and internal scanning of stakeholders.
Three stakeholder groups that should be subjected to further evaluation to support the strategic initiatives of the organization
An active board – the active board, should be involved in strategic planning for many reasons. The trustees usually have important insights resulting from their expertise and entrepreneurial activities. Since strategic initiatives usually carry high price tags and comprise of policy considerations, they often need boarder consent. In cases where board affiliates are involved in designing the strategic plan from which such initiates come from, higher chances of understanding their underlying rationale and be more willing to support them. According to (Istepanian et al., 2014), the importance of board members having involved is to design the overall direction.
Include physicians – it is important to involve those with the real stake in the organization to define and set strategic directions for the enterprise. It is the unique role of the physicians that design many of the most crucial hitches experienced by hospitals and health systems. The UnitedHealth Group physicians are essential in discharging its mandate. In my opinion, many physicians want and expect to be involved in strategic leadership. There is continuity of processes and procedures when physicians are involved in strategic planning (Cox and Semanskee, 2016).
The last stakeholder is the chief strategist – the chief strategist formulates the strategic plan alone. Other key players such as managers and CEO brings insightful information when making decisions. Good listening skills are important assets for any strategist. In UnitedHealth Group, the chief strategist must be an active participant in planning rather than a stoic observer. The CEO set initiatives within the context of its most significant challenges and its aspirations for the future (Berkowitz, 2016).
A stakeholder perspective on mission and vision statements of UnitedHealth Group
The use of stakeholder to explain the perspectives and content of mission statements. The purpose of mission and vision statements alongside stakeholders is to provide the projected outcomes and uphold the feasibility of its products and services. The stakeholders affect the way a health care system implements an approach and recognize its mission and vision. This becomes the primary purpose why leaders must consider stakeholders’ interest, necessities, and inclinations. Influence reflects a stakeholder’s virtual supremacy over and within an enterprise; importance designates the degree to which the organization cannot be deliberated effectively if a stakeholder’s expectations, needs, and issues are not considered (Berkowitz, 2016). Characteristically, stakeholder assessment of both quantitative and qualitative performance efficiency will determine whether management is functional. Stakeholder analysis when developed along the mission and vision statements help organization meet or exceed the needs of its key stakeholders. Stakeholder Involvement Paper – UnitedHealth Care Group Inc. Strategic Planning Approach
UnitedHealth Group approach to addressing recent health care legislation, and an evaluation of the strategic response that is commonly employed
After the passage of the Affordable Care Act (ACA) in 2010, the healthcare industry changed. Some of the changes were experienced in savings, take the risk, and when forming relationships that were previously forbidden. Changing trends of accountable care organizations (ACOs), Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health (HITECH), Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) and the Joint Commission has greatly affected the stakeholders in revenue-driving consolidation, growth of structured quality measures, patients becoming more informed consumers, and information technology innovations driving inter-stakeholder communications (Gulati et al., 2016). The commonly strategic response that is executed is using the federal government to implement the national quality strategy to increase the quality of healthcare and to minimize its cost.
Conclusion
The stakeholder’s involvement often opens avenues to further align business practices with community requirements and anticipations assisting in driving long-term maintenance and shareholder value. Stakeholder involvement should be conducted when the health care system adopts the required inputs from the individuals involved in the organization for decision making, planning, and strategic initiatives implementations. Effective stakeholder involvement helps healthcare organizations such as UnitedHealth Group to navigate over its competitors easily and changing business climates. Stakeholder Involvement Paper – UnitedHealth Care Group Inc. Strategic Planning Approach
References
Berkowitz, E. N. (2016). Essentials of health care marketing. Jones & Bartlett Publishers.
Cox, C., & Semanskee, A. (2016). Analysis of UnitedHealth Group’s Premium and Participation in ACA Marketplaces. Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation.
Davis, K. (2014). Different stakeholder groups and their perceptions of project success. International Journal of Project Management, 32(2), 189-201. Stakeholder Involvement Paper – UnitedHealth Care Group Inc. Strategic Planning Approach
Gulati, R., Mayo, A. J., & Nohria, N. (2016). Management: An Integrated Approach. Cengage Learning.
Istepanian, R., Laxminarayan, S., & Pattichis, C. S. (2014). M-health. John Wiley & Sons.
Stakeholder Involvement Paper – UnitedHealth Care Group Inc. Strategic Planning Approach