HR and IT Capabilities and Complementarities in Healthcare

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DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): This study will examine how healthcare organizations can enhance their clinical outcomes via managing human resources (HR) and information technologies (IT) more effectively. Research evidence suggests that knowledge-based service organizations often have difficulty improving performance by using management practices devised for manufacturing organizations. Further, HR and IT functions are thought to play a fundamental rather than a supportive role in managing knowledge based services such as healthcare organizations. Healthcare organizations have generally overlooked the critical role that HR can play in furthering their performance. Similarly, their investments in IT have not produced the desired results. This has occurred, we believe, at least partly, due to healthcare organizations not developing internal HR and IT capabilities that are essential for conceiving and implementing effective HR and IT initiatives. This study will test the validities and reliabilities of scales measuring HR and IT capabilities using a national sample of 400 short-term acute care hospitals and 200 critical access hospitals drawn from all the four major geographical regions of the United States. In addition, the relationship of HR and IT capabilities with the quality of patient care will be investigated. PUBLIC HEALTH RELEVANCE: Information (IT) and people (HR) are critical inputs in the health care delivery process. The basic premise of this study is that health care organizations can improve the health care delivery significantly by building internal capabilities in both IT and HR that would enable these organizations to manage their information and human resources more effectively.