Through the looking glass: Confronting health care management's biggest challenges in the wake of a crisis.

Abstract

The challenges brought on by the pandemic triggered a renewed scholarly focus on managing during crises. Now, 3 years on, having covered the initial crisis response, it is important to reevaluate what the crisis has taught us about health care management more generally. In particular, it is useful to consider the persistent challenges that continue to face health care organizations in the wake of a crisis. The present article aims to identify the biggest challenges that currently face health care managers in order to formulate a postcrisis research agenda. We employ an exploratory qualitative study, utilizing in-depth interviews with hospital executives and management to explore the persistent challenges facing managers in practice. Our qualitative inquiry reveals three key challenges that extend beyond the crisis and are salient for health care managers and organizations in the years to come. Specifically, we identify the centrality of human resource constraints (amidst increasing demand), the necessity of collaboration (amidst competition), and a need to reconsider the approach to leadership (utility of humility). We conclude by drawing upon relevant theories such as paradox theory to formulate a research agenda for health care management scholars that can support the creation of novel solutions and approaches to persistent challenges in practice. We identify several implications for organizations and health systems, including the need to eliminate competition and the importance of building human resource management capacities within organizations. In highlighting areas for future research, we provide organizations and managers with useful and actionable insights to address their most persistent challenges in practice.