Case: Selecting Patient escorts

Synopsis
The case explain the issues faced by the hospital; regarding its patient escorts. It had
identified various issues and also suggested some of the corrective measure to address these
issues.
Case Issues
1. What are the major issues faced by City hospital regarding escort service of the
hospital?
2. Are the recruitment process of the hospital appropriate enough?
3. Are the measures of improvement suggested in the case sufficient and feasible?
4. What are the courses of action which can solve the problem in short run as well as in
long run?
Case facts
1. City hospital is one of five major hospitals in the area of large Midwestern city. Local
or visiting celebrities visited the hospital.
2. Among 4500 employee, 40 are escorts who are responsible to assist the patient when
they leave the hospital. They are the last contact person of the patient with the
hospital.
3. There is 25 % employee turnover and 25 % upward mobility of the escort in the
hospital.
4. Few complaints in the past years are registered regarding rude or rough behavior of
the escort. The identification of misbehaving escorts is rather difficult as well as when
identified no actions could be taken against them due to lack of proper information.
5. To compensate the vacant position, vacancy announcement is made in which
minimum 20 applicants apply. Among them top 2 or 3 get selected and are
interviewed by HR department followed by patient escort supervisor.
6. The pay for the job is good. The job require less skills and are easy to perform.
7. The new recruits attend orientation program as well as on the job training after the
appointment.
8. Meeting of hospital administrator, chief supervisor and HR department identified
some gap like lack of enough tools in application blank which give insight about the
personality of the applicant, in adequate reference check, in sufficient interview
process and more over lack of certain test to assess the personality and attitude of the
applicants.

Analysis
Hospital fit into service industry and in service industry attitude and discipline of the
employee matter a lot. In addition, the target group of the hospital is local or visiting
celebrities who demand more better and high standard of service. Although all other services
are adequate and the service provided by the escort are not to the mark, the patient leaving the
hospital might claim the service was not worthy. In past year some complaints were
registered against the service provided by escort. Besides that, high turnover among this
group of employee is another issue to the hospital. On one hand, escort are not maintaining
the standard of service and in other hand 25% (around 10) are leaving the organization and
25% are promoted or transferred within the organization. Thus, the major issues faced by the
city hospital is to improve the service standard provided by the escort as well as to recruit and
select suitable escort.
The hospital recruit the escort through vacancy notices followed by evaluation of application
blank and interview. However, no information about the recruitment procedure are disclosed
in the case. If we analyses the turnover and upward mobility of the escort in the hospital, the
number reach around 20 and minimum 20 application and selection of top 2 or 3 among them
is rather confusing. Although the hospital might had implement need based recruitment
strategy but in the large and reputed organization like city hospital, vacancy forecasting is
must. And moreover, instead of recruiting few candidates time and again, all needed
candidates should be recruited once or twice a year. It can save time and effort for the
recruitment process. Due to lack of information, we cannot argue that the recruitment
objective, target group or other necessary recruitment strategies are properly set but for the
job of this kind which doesnt need enough skills and the pay is also good attracting qualified
candidates might not be the problem. 25% upward mobility of the employee also suggested
that the organization provide enough career development opportunities.
Among the measure of improvement, the participants agreed to develop an attitude test, but it
require more time and effort. Other suggestion are also equally valid suggestion and might
require less time and effort. The application blank doesnt capture enough personality insight
of the applicant which can be included in the application blank. The suggestion of including
4-5 stressful situation during interviewing process is also equally valid and might
differentiate the candidates with positive and negative attitude. Including three letter of

reference in the application also somewhat capture the personality or ability of the applicant.
However, all four should not be treated as an option but they are the complementary
techniques for selecting eligible patient escort. The cost and time of developing these
instrument can be cheaper when compared to the low quality of service provided by patient
escorts and it negative effect in the image of hospital.
The recruitment process alone cannot solve the issues of low service standard provided by the
patient escort. Some systems like reward and incentive to good performer are missing in the
organization. To reward the good performer and discourage the poor performer, first they
should be identified and separate the performer from non-performer. Nurse or admin officer
should be responsible to track the record of patient escort like which patient is served by
whom. They along with customer should fill the feedback form before the service is
completed. In this way the performance of the escort can be evaluated and hence their
behavior can be improved.
Another minor issues if the City hospital is the lack of assessment of orientation program or
on the job training provided to the new recruitment. The basic objectives of these training or
intervention is to develop the competencies of new recruits to serve patient effectively which
doesnt seems to be happening. Hence, proper evaluation of these programs need to be done
and had to be modified accordingly.
Recommendation
1. Big five test or other simple personality diagnostic test should be included in
application blank.
2. Few stressful situation should be included during the interview process and at least
telephone checking of reference should be done.
3. The recruitment process should be formalized and planned accordingly. Instead of
irregular hiring, regular hiring once or twice a year should be practice.
4. Database of information regarding the service of patient escort should be maintained
and evaluated periodically.
5. Reward system should be established to motivate the good performer.
6. Orientation program and on the job training should be evaluated and modified as per
the requirement.

Submitted by: Sudan Pudasaini