Managerial strategies to reorient hospitals towards health promotion: Lessons from organisational theory

Abstract

Purpose

Reorienting health services towards health promotion is one of the major health promotion strategies stipulated by the Ottawa Charter). Important contradictions, tensions and barriers to health promotion implementation associated with organisational structures have, thus far, been underexposed in the hospital health promotion discourse. This paper aims at identifying risks and the chances for hospital management to strategically and sustainably reorient their hospitals towards health promotion.

Design/methodology/approach

The paper combines theories and findings from organisational science and management studies as well as from capacity development in the form of a narrative literature review. The aim is to focus on the conditions hospitals, as organisational systems with a highly professionalised workforce, provide for a strategically managed reorientation towards health promotion. Models and principles helping managers to navigate the difficulties and complexities of health promotion reorientation will be suggested.

Findings

Hospital managers have to deal with genuine obstacles in the complexity and structural formation of hospital organisations. Against this background, continuous management support, a transformative leadership style, participative strategic management and expert governance can be considered important organisational capacities for the reorientation towards a new concept such as health promotion.

Practical implications

This paper discusses managerial strategies, effective structural transformations and important organisational capacities that can contribute to a sustainable reorientation of hospitals towards health promotion. It supports hospital managers in exploring their chances of facilitating and effectively supporting a sustainable health promotion reorientation of their hospitals.

Originality/value

The paper provides an innovative approach where the focus is on enhanced possibilities for hospital managers to strategically manage the reorientation towards health promotion.

Citation

Röthlin, F. (2013), "Managerial strategies to reorient hospitals towards health promotion: Lessons from organisational theory", Journal of Health Organization and Management, Vol. 27 No. 6, pp. 747-761. https://doi.org/10.1108/JHOM-07-2011-0070