The Diversity Of The Healthcare Workforce

The healthcare workforce is suffering critically due to its lack in diversity. As healthcare organizations are growing and the number of patients is increasing, so is the diversity of the patients. There are more minority patients are the number of minorities increase in the United States. The need for minority employees is crucial in that they are needed to help assist patients who have the similar cultural, racial, and ethnic upbringings. There are many barriers in healthcare workforce that are keeping minorities from reaching their full potential to become employees in healthcare, particularly upper-level leadership positions; as patients continue to become more diverse, so does the need of employees.

An increase in minority employment in healthcare organizations has increased, but there lacks an increase in positions of leadership and management. Those positions that have increases are lower level positions of the hospital such as janitors and cooks that are very well still important, but do not play a role in leadership and management. These positions do not require an educational or leadership background. The problem that healthcare management is facing is the lack of diversity in leadership there are very few minorities who have positions as chief executive officers (CEOs), health service managers, and healthcare support employees. The percentage of CEOs are 11.7%, health service managers account for 21.5%, and 43.6% of healthcare support employees are a minority. Whereas, minorities who hold maids and housekeeping cleaners positions are 62.3% which is more than any other position (Gabor 2008). To change these percentages, minorities need to become more educational involved in healthcare and leadership by receiving degr...

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...should become more open minded when creating an application pool for job seekers. They should make the application and hiring process less bias and discriminatory in order for minorities to have a better opportunity at gaining a job in healthcare leadership and management. To prevent employers from believing social stereotypes, they must educate themselves on other races and ethnicities backgrounds to have a better understanding of them and their beliefs. As the diversity of the United States population continue to rise, the demand for diversity in healthcare is on a steady increase. It is vital for healthcare organizations to add diversity in their workforce to benefit patients’ comfortability when seeking medical attention. The barriers that stand in the recruitment of minority employees should be broken to benefit both healthcare organizations and their patients.