Customer Reviews

Creating the New American Hospital: A Time for Greatness (Jossey-Bass Health Series)

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V. Clayton Sherman has written a wonderful dissertation about how the hospital system in this country is run. He also gives a wonderful blueprint of how to correct one of the most mismanaged businesses in the country. The hospital system today is struggling under HEAVY regulatory and monetary restrictions. But if these regulations had been in place from the beginning, like the banking industry, the participants wouldn't be running around like "chickens with their heads cut off" to fulfill "minimum standards" of Joint Commission and other like entites. What the industry desperately needs is a complete overhaul. Mr. Sherman gives the plan to follow in redoing the management of this industry, by throwing out the antiquated notions of management, and starting from the ground up to rebuild on a customer satisfaction driven premise. He sites Wal-Mart and how Sam Walton's idea of keeping the customer number one would work well in the hospital too....but this would require some different rules and some very different thinking. I strongly feel this should be REQUIRED reading for ALL hospital management!

I've been in hospital middle-management for more than 20 years. Very early in this book, Sherman states that the reason why hospitals fail is because of bad management. Not the government, not the insurance companies, not the high cost of technology. He offers a terrific approach and identifies the need to totally change how hospitals are run, based on seven Key Result Areas. His principles are quite similar to those of Jack Welch - the importance of great people, integrity, and "the customer is king". This should be required reading for every CEO and department head in every American hospital.