On behalf of the editorial team – Regina Herzlinger, Kevin Schulman, Lawrence Van Horn, and myself – I am delighted to welcome you to Volume 3 of HMPI featuring a strong set of new articles central to our core goal: drawing from the research and experience of scholars and practicing leaders to advance healthcare and health systems. The authors offer innovative, highly relevant approaches to improving health sector management practices worldwide.
In this issue of HMPI, the authors:
- Explore how immunity from legal liability affects healthcare quality;
- Study the adoption of telehealth practices;
- Discuss opportunities for global health organizations to act as value chain integrators in bringing partners together to deliver outstanding services;
- Highlight opportunities to improve management education for healthcare leaders;
- Identify trends in the roles of chief innovation officers in U.S. hospitals;
- Examine how countries can learn from each other in providing services for aging populations, and
- Provide insights about how to translate core ideas from consumer behavior theory into healthcare marketing.
Together, the work is highly relevant for leaders of public and private health organizations in the U.S. and globally.
Healthcare is now one of the largest – if not the largest – employer in economies around the world. The Bureau of Labor Statistics in the U.S. reports more than 19 million jobs in healthcare and social assistance in 2016 (12.2% of the work force), projecting growth to more than 23 million jobs (13.8% of the work force) in 2026. In Canada, similarly, Statistics Canada reports that healthcare and social assistance jobs accounted for 12.8% of the workforce in 2017, second only to wholesale and retail trade (15.3%). Healthcare also makes major contributions to economic output – more than $2 trillion in the U.S. in 2016 (7.1% of the economy). Healthcare is central to the economy, to innovative development, and to human well-being.
Yet, in country after country, those healthcare jobs and productive output are often managed poorly. The core problem is not that healthcare leaders do not care or work hard. Instead, many of the issues arise from challenges concerning management skills. Some of those challenges involve the need for stronger skills of individual health sector leaders. Many challenges, though, arise because of weak integration and misaligned incentives across the many fragmented silos of healthcare systems. Quite simply, the health sector is too large and too important to allow the problems that arise from poor management – whether from weak individual skills or from misalignment along the healthcare value chain – to continue.
The authors of the articles that we publish are committed to improving management practices in health systems around the world. We welcome your comments about the ideas that the articles spark and your ideas for subsequent articles. Please send us your comments to info@hmpi.org. We also welcome discussion on the BAHM Forum on LinkedIn [https://www.linkedin.com/groups/7042389] and on Twitter, https://twitter.com/HMPI_Journal.
If you have an idea that you would like to explore for HMPI, please send an outline of your article to our editorial team at info@hmpi.org.
Will Mitchell
Professor of Strategic Management
Anthony S. Fell Chair in New Technologies and Commercialization
Rotman School of Management, University of Toronto