• Formulating the correct healthcare strategies.
• Developing the required skills of the hospital staff to improve their performance levels.
• Maintaining healthcare regulatory compliance.
• Procuring the medical equipment and other resources for building the hospital infrastructure adequately.
• Streamlining the hospital expenses and workflow.
• Creating  a sufficient source of fund for maintaining adequate service levels to meet patient demands and sustain the hospital business in the competitive market.

• Managing the healthcare services by carefully handling all the functional and operational aspects of the hospital.
• Doing adequate strategic planning to ensure that the hospital business is stable and forecasting  futuristic demands of the related healthcare logistics.
• Gaining sound knowledge of the healthcare domain, information technology, best practices of the industry and the latest innovations to maintain technological proficiency.
• Developing and implementing operational policies and procedures and enforcing rules to ensure that patient safety and care ethics are not compromised.
• Recognizing the latest trends in data and doing accurate forecasting for planning future projects and monitoring the day-to-day functioning of the hospital.
• Assisting the Human Resource(HR) department of the hospital in recruiting candidates for various hospital staff vacancies.
• Building an ethical and  patient-centric culture in the hospital that encourages all employees to be top performers and execute their duties seamlessly with high morale.
• Overseeing the various financial aspects of the hospital including budgeting, auditing, planning and reporting.
• Being a good role model and mentor to the hospital staff by displaying strong leadership skills.
• Ensuring that the hospital abides by all the pertinent healthcare rules and regulations by scrupulously fulfilling the legal formalities.
• Fostering and maintaining a close relationship with the senior stakeholders of the hospital.
• Working closely with the hospital senior management to formulate both short-term and long-term goals and determining the values, vision and mission in line with it.
• Building lasting external alliances and partnerships with other healthcare organizations including hospitals, diagnostic clinics, therapy centres, pharmacies, medical and nursing colleges and research institutes.
• Enriching communication and trustful relationships between hospital employees and the senior management.
• Solving existing operational issues, gauging potential threats and opportunities for the hospital business.

• Educational background in Operations Management or related areas.
• Good experience and interest in the field of management and operations.
• Strong leadership qualities.
• Thorough understanding of financial management and budgeting concepts like profit and loss, cash flows and balance sheet.
• Excellent team-building and communication skills.
• Robust strategic planning, analytical and logical thinking capabilities.
• Ability for doing negotiation and building consensus and relationships amongst various stakeholders including hospital employees, managers and outside partners.

• According to the World Health Organization, one in ten patients encounters safety concerns while receiving treatment.
• There are more than 43 million patient safety incidents globally every year.
• Errors due to dispensing of wrong medications and drugs worldwide cost approximately USD 42 billion annually!

The Top 10 Patient Safety Issues

1. Wrong and erroneous diagnosis - This happens to be a multi-faced problem that is a result of various cognitive or systemic factors or sometimes a combination of both. It is a challenging issue as it often goes unnoticed until the patient is discharged. Miscommunication also causes diagnostic errors.
2. Unsafe usage of opioid medications for treatment – Opioids are medicines given for treating pain. They usually have addictive properties and physiological impact which may result in dangerous side-effects on the patient’s health. Often these drugs are misused in outpatient departments and referrals which may initiate self-medication in patients causing irreversible damage to body organs.
3. Lack of Internal Co-ordination - Failure to communication and lack of internal communication between the staff in hospitals leads to multiple consequences. This includes medication errors, delay in follow-up procedures and diagnostic lapses which deters effective treatment in patient care.
4. Staff induced Workarounds - Sometimes, hospital staff is tempted to circumvent a barrier by deploying their own workarounds between authorized and actual care practices. Though the problem may be temporarily solved, it is likely to go unnoticed and pose unsafe conditions to the patients endangering their lives.
5. Lack of Interoperability in Electronic Health Records (EHR) - Disparate and heterogeneous health systems deter the interoperability of EHRs which negatively impacts patient care. This creates hurdles by not providing a holistic view of the patient’s conditions particularly for medication reconciliation resulting in harmful drug interactions. EHR interoperability also hampers efficient care during emergencies and natural calamities.
6. Mismanagement of Behavioural Health - Acute healthcare calls for sufficient and competent behavioural strategy interventions. Failure to disseminate this can result in episodes of patient self-harming, violence, unauthorised discharges, poor healthcare outcomes and undue interference in treatment.
7. Lack of Emergency Preparedness - There is a rise in natural calamities like hurricanes, forest fires, volcanoes, earthquakes and cyclones and even man-made disasters like terrorism and indiscriminate shootings. Unpreparedness in such situations results in wrong alterations of healthcare operations leading to mass casualties.
8. Inadequate Staffing – Lack of licensed and qualified staff increases workloads and negligence thereby causing a rise of patient mortality rates.
9. Drug shortages - Severe shortages of emergency medications delay life-saving procedures leading to fatalities.
10. Lack of Hygiene - Failure in providing hygienic conditions and sterilized medical equipment leads to compromised care and has devastating effects.